T-R PHOTO BY ROBERT MAHARRY — From left to right, Supervisors Jarret Heil, Carol Hibbs and Kevin Goodman discuss the Marshall County budget and tax rates before approving them unanimously during Wednesday morning’s regular meeting.

A little over two weeks after holding a standalone hearing on the proposed budget and tax rate for the upcoming fiscal year, the Marshall County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved both items during Wednesday morning’s regular meeting.

First, a public hearing was held with no written or verbal comments from anyone in the audience, but Supervisor Jarret Heil did take the opportunity to present information that was also available online or in hard copies distributed at the meeting. He highlighted the results of a recent 2023-2024 audit review from Eide Bailly showing a 5.8 percent — or $5,009,366 — increase in net position over the ending balances from Fiscal Year 2022-2023 with an ending fund balance jump of $3.4 million and no new debt incurred.

The county’s overall debt burden was reduced 12.5 percent to $3.2 million, which falls well under the $170 million debt limit.

“We’re not even close to that, and I don’t have any anticipation of us ever getting close to that anytime soon,” Heil said.

Revenues from FY 23-24 were $41.3 million, while expenditures were $39.7 million. Heil described it as “a nice, clean audit” the supervisors were happy about before shifting his focus to the current fiscal year, which includes a re-estimated budget of $42.2 million. Of that, the estimated fund balances $4.3 million in general basic (44 percent of expenditures), $2.6 million in general supplemental (50 percent) and $2.7 million in rural services (50 percent of expenditures).

He added that the overall debt has been reduced by $575,000 during the current fiscal year. As was explained in a subsequent email, the board took out a General Obligation Capital Loan of $4.6 million in 2021 to pay for the radio tower project and courthouse reconstruction expenses. Auditor/Recorder Nan Benson said the total outstanding balance on the loan will be $2.35 million at the end of the current fiscal year, and that number will drop down to $1.77 million by the end of FY26 once payments are made.

“I think the key part, in the middle of this year, was a lot of good collaboration within our departments through all of our budget processes that really helped kind of whittle things down and have a better target for the current year and put us in really good standing for our budget positioning that we’re currently going to approve today,” Heil said.

From there, he moved on to the budget proposal for the upcoming fiscal year, which is currently estimated at $41.18 million, a decrease of just over $1 million from the FY 24-25 re-estimated budget. He noted an increase of $700,000 in funding for law enforcement, public safety and legal services and a $3 million investment in roads, bridges and operations, which is supplemented with state funds such as the road use tax money.

The new budget also includes no new debt and, as previously mentioned, another payment of around $580,000 toward the current outstanding balance. As for taxes, the general basic, rural basic and debt service levy rates will all be reduced to $3.36 per $1,000 of valuation, $3.03 per $1,000 and $0.26 per $1,000, respectively. Conversely, the general supplemental levy is proposed to increase by five percent from $2.57 per $1,000 to $2.70, primarily due to rising insurance costs, and the total county levy is increasing 0.6 percent from $9.30 per $1,000 to $9.35.

Because valuations continue to trend upward on the whole, this will result in a 1.9 percent increase in general basic tax askings, a 1.7 percent increase in rural basic, no change in debt service, and an 8.1 percent increase in general supplemental for a total increase of 3.9 percent or $602,548. The county’s total tax askings are projected at $16.2 million for the upcoming fiscal year.

Heil added that with less than half of the county’s overall budget coming from local property taxes, much of the rest comes from state agencies and funds. The final slide of his presentation covered budget “challenges” — for example, valuations increased 2.78 percent with 2.8 percent inflation and a 2.5 percent increase in cost of living. Insurance costs are projected to jump about $200,000 or 26.4 percent.

“That’s the key piece when you look at what we did with our reductions in the levies of general basic, that right there shows you that we really did a great job with our departments on holding the line in a variety of areas. We were able to make the commitment to increases in public safety as well as maintaining that (investment) for secondary roads as well as doing wage increases for staff,” he said.

Most staff received three percent pay hikes along with five percent in conservation and seven percent at the Marshall County Sheriff’s Office due to union negotiations.

“Kind of like our discussion item earlier with Jordan (Gaffney), we found some good efficiencies in reducing down staff, but we need to be competitive to hire people. So there’s a lot of good movement that we saw within our departments to be efficient, and I think our general basic line really demonstrates that,” Heil said.

Although he expressed his preference to balance the increase in tax askings with the growth in valuations, Heil cited the insurance issue and some still unresolved obligations with the courthouse project as reasons behind the proposed budget in an effort to avoid reducing fund balances any further.

“The budget process never really ends even though we will have a vote today that will conclude this process. We can make reductions and cost savings for us within our budget through the appropriations process,” he said. “We can still reduce our appropriations to set some more money aside that we can hopefully return back to the taxpayers or pay for any more unforeseen bills that may come up down the line.”

Board Chairwoman Carol Hibbs thanked Heil for the summary and described the budgeting process as “good” and “thorough,” also crediting Benson and her staff — the auditor/recorder made sure to specifically shout out one of her assistants, Maria Vargas Gonzalez — for all of their work to provide information allowing the supervisors to finalize a budget. With no further comments, the public hearing was closed, and the budget was adopted as presented by a unanimous vote.

During the subsequent public comment period, Heil referenced the fact that property tax reform legislation is still being considered at the Statehouse and wondered whether action would materialize during this session or be delayed for another year or two.

“We’ll wait and see, so thanks everyone for paying attention through their affiliates on what those processes are. I know Nan’s paying attention quite a bit. (County Assessor) Blaze (Wurr) is sending us, all the time, different things from the assessor’s affiliate that’s keeping us up to date on it,” he said.

Hibbs also expressed appreciation for the communications from Marshalltown Area Chamber of Commerce President/CEO John Hall on bills being considered and asking how they would affect local governments if passed. Benson said some of the proposals aren’t expected to be enacted until 2030, but that would come up quicker than people may think.

“They are really evaluating it very carefully. I feel like they’re really doing their due diligence in Des Moines,” Benson said.

After criticism of the process surrounding the last major property tax reform bill, House File 718, Heil felt the legislature was taking its time to solicit feedback before pursuing any sweeping changes.

“When it’s property taxes, it’s hard to have all the information straight because it really is a complex process, and nonetheless, I think we all are learning something from it in this process,” he said. “It’s a wild ride down at the legislature. We’ll see what happens.”

The Auditor/Recorder’s office, Benson added, is willing to provide tax estimates for property owners who are uncertain about their upcoming bill.

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Contact Robert Maharry

at 641-753-6611 ext. 255 or

rmaharry@timesrepublican.com.