2009 Town of Kinderhook Tax Rate:
$1.28 per thousand outside of the Villages,
$0.59 per thousand in the Villages.
As a comparison,
Village of Valatie $2.69 per thousand
Village of Kinderhook $2.52 per thousand.
Excluded from the Village taxes are the special district charges for water and sewage user fees which are in addition to the Real Estate Tax. The Town has an Ambulance District, a lighting distict and two fire districts with separate funds and are not included in the above. On the Columbia County website at:
http://www.columbiacountyny.com/depts/rps/rates.html
are all the taxes for the towns, county, villages, school districts and special districts.
The reason the Town Real Estate Tax is less in the Villages is because Village residents pay into the “A Fund” only. They do not pay into the “B Fund” or “DB Fund”. The DB fund is for highways and the Villages are responsible for the care of its streets and roads. The “B Fund” also applies only to activities outside of the villages such as Land Use issues of Zoning, planning etc.
This year the tax per thousand increased 0.08 per thousand in the A Fund, known as the “general fund”. The tax increase in the B and DB funds were $ 0.03 per thousand and $0.31 per thousand respectfully. As can be seen the biggest increase has been in the Highway fund which has gone from 22 cents per thousand to 53 cents per thousand.
There are many reasons for the increase but the main reason is the lack of an unexpended fund balance. Unexpended fund balances result from spending less than budgetted or receiving more income than expected. For the past 8 years or so we saw ever increasing sales and mortgage recording taxes, the result of which was the ability to stabilize and in most years reduce the tax rate. In 2008. not only did that not happen, but fuel costs drove up everything the highway department does. Additional costs associated with the new highway building also helped to use up our “rainy day” or unexpended fund balances. Not only have taxes increased as shown above but the expectation of funds becomes critical to our cash flow. Although, taxes are received in January and February, sales tax revenue and mortgage recording tax revenue are quarterly and twice a year respectively.
Other municipalities may have similar situations. For example, out tax rate in the areas outside of the town increased $0.50 per thousand, whereas the Village of Valatie increased its tax rate by $0.60 per thousand.
