{"id":1311943,"date":"2019-06-29T21:08:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-30T03:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/basalt-town-council-debates-paying-property-tax-refunds-or-taking-issue-to-ballot\/"},"modified":"2019-06-29T21:08:00","modified_gmt":"2019-06-30T03:08:00","slug":"basalt-town-council-debates-paying-property-tax-refunds-or-taking-issue-to-ballot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/basalt-town-council-debates-paying-property-tax-refunds-or-taking-issue-to-ballot\/","title":{"rendered":"Basalt Town Council debates paying property tax refunds or taking issue to ballot"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Basalt leaders are contemplating whether to grant a refund for a property tax overcharge or to take the issue to the ballot.<\/strong>
Aspen Times file<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Basalt Town Council is still unsettled on how to solve a property tax overcharge despite insistence from its staff and outside experts that the evidence is clear that refunds are owed.<\/p>\n

Councilman Auden Schendler said he had to \u201crespectfully disagree\u201d with the staff direction.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the town got way out over its skis on this,\u201d Schendler said.<\/p>\n

Council didn\u2019t dig into the research well enough before the town government declared that there was likely an overcharge, he said. He noted that former Basalt mayors Rick Stevens and Leroy Duroux have gone on the record saying they believed during their tenures that a 1994 town vote set a ceiling on the property tax mill levy and that the annual mill levy could fluctuate in any given year as long as it didn\u2019t exceed that ceiling.<\/p>\n

\u201cLeroy\u2019s a legendary fiscal hawk,\u201d Schendler said.<\/p>\n

Then he dropped a bombshell in the discussion.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy position is we should let this go,\u201d Schendler said. \u201cIf someone doesn\u2019t agree with that, they can take us to the courts. I think the best action is to let this go and see what happens.\u201d<\/p>\n

His declaration visibly rattled staff members and some other council members. No other council member expressed favor for letting the issue go.<\/p>\n

Basalt is grappling with a suspected violation of the Colorado Taxpayers\u2019 Bill of Rights, approved statewide by voters in 1992. It limits revenue that can be collected and requires a vote for tax increases.<\/p>\n

Local governments had an option of easing the restrictions with a vote. That maneuver was dubbed \u201cde-Brucing\u201d in reference to TABOR\u2019s principal author, Douglas Bruce.<\/p>\n

Basalt residents voted 224-42 in April 1994 to de-Bruce. The ballot language allows the town government to keep increases in property taxes and sales taxes due to growth, but it also states there will be no tax increases without a vote of the people.<\/p>\n

Basalt increased its property tax mill levy 10 times since 2005. While the mill levy didn\u2019t exceed the 1994 level, it did increase from the prior year.<\/p>\n

Basalt\u2019s top administrators are new to their positions within the past two years. Finance director Christy Hamrick reported the mill levy increases to Town Manager Ryan Mahoney and Town Attorney Jeff Conklin. They consulted with outside sources to determine Basalt probably violated TABOR.<\/p>\n

Mahoney reinforced that position Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my mind, I don\u2019t have any doubt that we over-collected,\u201d he said, adding that he felt it was an accident by previous administrations. \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019re OK.\u201d<\/p>\n

The town\u2019s outside expert, Dee Weiser, an attorney who is recognized in the state as an expert in TABOR, concurred, though he also said, \u201cWe\u2019re in unchartered waters.\u201d<\/p>\n

No taxing district in Colorado has interpreted TABOR as past Basalt administrations did, he said.<\/p>\n

Weiser said if his malpractice insurance was on the line, \u201cI will tell you to refund the money.\u201d<\/p>\n

That touched off conversation about how to resolve the issue with voters. Councilman Bill Infante said Basalt has no choice but to ask voters to establish a new property tax mill levy ceiling. If the question fails, Basalt would have to still to a mill levy of 2.562, the lowest level it ever reached post-TABOR.<\/p>\n

Infante labeled the issue the \u201cnuclear question\u201d because the implications are so large for the town. Sticking to a 2.562 mill levy would severely impinge revenue.<\/p>\n

Council members also kicked around the idea of asking a separate question on whether a refund should be given for property tax over-collection. TABOR limits a taxing entity\u2019s liability to four years. In Basalt\u2019s case, that would require a refund of about $2 million.<\/p>\n

If voters approved that question, Basalt would be forgiven for past TABOR violations.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomeone could still sue you but they wouldn\u2019t prevail,\u201d town attorney Conklin said.<\/p>\n

Councilwoman Katie Schwoerer said she wants the path that is least \u201cpainful\u201d for the town.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m willing to have a conversation whether we go to the ballot or not\u201d on the refund issue, she said.<\/p>\n

Infante also said that it was new information to him that Basalt wouldn\u2019t be exposed to a TABOR violation if voters decided the refunds didn\u2019t need to be issued. He said he needed more time to digest that information.<\/p>\n

Mahoney said the staff felt giving the refund without a vote would \u201cbuild a community will\u201d toward approving the mill levy the town seeks.<\/p>\n

Going to the ballot on a controversial refund question could potentially make it more difficult to get the mill levy passed in a separate question, Mayor Jacque Whitsitt and other officials said. Whitsitt supports granting the refund and putting the mill levy question on the ballot.<\/p>\n

Council didn\u2019t reach a decision but pledged to debate the issue fully at one of its meetings in July.<\/p>\n

scondon@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Basalt leaders are contemplating whether to grant a refund for a property tax overcharge or to take the issue to the ballot.Aspen Times file Basalt Town Council is still unsettled on how to solve a property tax overcharge despite insistence from its staff and outside experts that the evidence is clear that refunds are owed. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1311943","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-19 20:16:36","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1311943"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311943\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1311943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1311943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1311943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}