Village maintains status quo

After nearly an hour of debate the Lawrence village board voted unanimously to maintain its current tax rate and not approve Mayor Martin Oliner’s proposed tax cut at the March 31 meeting.

That reduction would have saved residents an average of nearly $60 on their annual taxes.

Instead of Oliner’s planned cut of 3.66 percent that would of dropped the tax rate to $68.98 per $100 of assessed value the rate will remain at $71.60 per $100.

But the streak of not raising taxes in Lawrence remains in tact. It is now seven consecutive years that taxes have not increased in the village.

The adopted budget is $6,173460.62 a decrease of $381,802.38, or 5.82 percent, from the current fiscal plan of $6,555,263. The new fiscal year begins on June 1, 2011 and ends on May 31, 2012.

“It is not the right time [for a tax decrease],” said Deputy Mayor Joel Mael, who added that possibly next year the plan “might have some validity to it.”

Though he voted to approve the budget, Oliner still thinks that Lawrence residents should be getting back a portion of their money considering the village’s reserve fund balance is nearly $7 million. “I think we owe our citizens the return of their money,” he said during the debate.

Trustee C. Simon Felder, Oliner’s most recent predecessor, echoed Mael’s thinking.

“Truthfully the [tax cut] is meaningless,” said Felder, who noted that Lawrence is one of the few villages with such a large reserve fund balance. “I feel very jittery,” he added concerning the current economic climate.

What could be making Felder jittery is the loss of $471,266 in taxes due to a village wide drop in the final overall property assessment from the current figure of $5,136,040 to the $4,664,774 projected in the new budget.

Trustees Michael Fragin and Ed Klar also noted that not only does the economy remain sluggish, but there are a couple of big-ticket items that the village will need money for in the near future.

“We are entering a period of uncertainty,” said Fragin who pointed to the negotiations regarding renewal of the contract with the Lawrence-Cedarhurst Fire Department and its proposal for a two-story building extension.