Deputy Auditor: Cleaning Up Wabash County’s Drug Problem Would Result In Lower Taxes

By Tim Arnett

WABASH,Indiana – ‘Tis the season for Wabash County residents to start preparing to pay their property tax bills by May 10^th and MiBash News has seen some slightly angry comments on social media regarding the increasing tax rate. One person on 105.9 The Bash’s Facebook page posted specific numbers from the county’s own website detailing the increased taxes this year: county up 3.26%, township up 40.47%, school district up 30.69%, city is 6.24% and the library is 6.8%.

So MiBash News went to the courthouse and talked to Marcie Shepherd, Chief Deputy Auditor for Wabash County. Shepherd confirmed that those increases are indeed accurate. And she said that they result from the frozen levy put in place around 10 years ago. The levy was frozen to help local taxpayers by keeping their taxes artificially low. She noted that other counties froze levies but for a much shorter time frame than Wabash County. Thus, instead of a gradual increase over time, residents of Wabash County saw a huge increase in the property tax bills when the levy was thawed in 2015. Shepherd also explained that the increases are simply necessary to keep the county’s taxing units functioning.

And we are still dealing with the implications of the freeze and thaw in 2016. But Shepherd went on to say that the current tax rate still isn’t nearly as high as what residents paid circa 2005 before the levy freeze.

Then Shepherd made a statement few in the county have likely considered. She introduced it by saying that the Sheriff’s Department, Probation Department and Community Corrections take up a great deal of the budget thanks to new mandates via the state.

Shepherd explained that every year more deputies have to be added, which means more people are arrested. Which means, in turn, more state-mandated probation officers and corresponding community corrections employees. So a potential decrease in taxes is another apparent incentive to reducing the drug problem the county faces.

When it comes to the 30.69% increase on what city of Wabash residents will pay on this year’s tax bill for Wabash City Schools, Matt Stone, Chief Business Officer for Wabash City Schools, admitted that those numbers are roughly accurate. But, he said, it’s only because residents payed so little last year for the school district. Normally, he stated, residents pay a tax rate of around $1.10 for Wabash City Schools, but last year the rate dropped to $0.88. This year, the specific rate is $1.15. When it comes to the referendum, Stone once again reiterated that no local property taxes goes into the school’s general fund. While local taxes do go toward the district’s transportation, debt service and capital projects funds, all the monies for the general fund comes directly from the state. Stone noted that the general fund pays teacher and staff’s salaries and benefits and it’s that fund – and only that fund – which the referendum addresses.