Kodiak’s property taxes are set to go down by one mill in the upcoming fiscal year.
The Kodiak Island Borough Assembly decided to lower the rate last week along with adopting a budget for Fiscal Year 2025. Other orders of business included certifying the property tax roll.
Kodiak’s mill rate, which is another term for property tax, across the entire Borough is currently 10.25 mills. A mill represents $1 per $1,000 of assessed property value. The new rate will be 9.25 mills.
During Thursday’s meeting, Assembly member James Turner said a mill rate of 9.25 better prepares the Borough for next year’s budget. He cited the max allowable property tax revenue or MAPTR, which limits how much property tax revenue the Borough can collect in a single fiscal year.
“As we limit our following year funds due to MAPTR, the school budget ask is potentially going to be higher next year because of how much they are using from their fund balance," Turner said. "It is not the cap on the MAPTR, but it is close, but it’s also a full mill reduction this year. And yes, I realize that [property] assessments are different, but it’s still less revenue than we took in last year.”
Turner said the proposed debt service revenue transfer out for FY 2025, under a 9.25 mill rate, would then be adjusted by $458,411.16.
But assembly members weren’t unanimous in their decision. Kodiak’s borough manager Aimee Williams had proposed a slightly lower mill rate of nine mills to kick off last week’s meeting.
Assembly member Ryan Sharratt argued that the mill rate should not be any higher than nine mills, despite what impact that might have on the Borough’s finances next year.
“I believe that as things sit socioeconomically right now, that it is in our best interest from a purely economical viewpoint to find the lowest mill rate that we can to provide taxation relief through property taxes for our homeowners," Sharratt said.
Despite his argument, Sharratt and fellow assembly members Bo Whiteside, and Steven Ames, were outvoted four to three. The new mill rate will go into effect at the beginning of July, which is the start of FY 2025.
The final budget includes almost $1.8 million for the Renewal & Replacement fund, $1,186,826.84 for the Debt Service fund, and $1,833,644,622 as the assessed value for all taxable real and personal property in the Kodiak Island Borough.
Aside from setting the lowered mill rate, the Borough Assembly also approved and certified the real and personal property tax roll for 2024 during the June 6 meeting.
The Fire Protection Area No. 1 Board’s request to reduce their service area’s mill rate to 1.35 mills was rejected by the Borough Assembly. Instead it will remain at 1.5 mills.
This year’s [2024] property taxes will be due later this fall, due on Oct. 15 if paid in one single payment, or half due on Aug. 15 and half on Nov. 15 if made in two payments.
Editor's Note: This article has been updated to layout where the $458,411.16 would show up in the budget. This amount is not total property tax revenue, which was previously misstated in this article. KMXT has corrected the the mistake and regrets the error.
