The majority of the Greensboro City Council expressed support for the proposed 4-cent property tax increase at the final work session on the 2023-2024 budget on Thursday, June 15.
From comments made at the work session, it appears the vote to approve City Manager Tai Jaiyeoba’s adjusted recommended budget of $749 million, with an 8.5 percent water and sewer rate increase and a 4-cent property tax increase, will pass by a 6-to-3 vote.
Mayor Nancy Vaughan and Councilmembers Zack Matheny and Marikay Abuzuaiter all spoke against the budget with the proposed tax increase, but Councilmembers Sharon Hightower, Tammi Thurm, Goldie Wells, Hugh Holston, Yvonne Johnson and Nancy Hoffmann all spoke in favor the budget with the tax increase.
The major changes in the budget presented on Thursday and the recommended budget presented on May 16 are in the starting salaries for police officers and starting salaries for hourly employees.
The budget presented at the work session, which seemed to have the approval of six councilmembers, raised the police starting salaries to $55,000 a year. The original recommendation was to raise police starting salaries to $52,400.
Vaughan noted that the City Council had passed a motion made by Abuzuaiter to raise police starting salaries to $57,000. Vaughan said that she could support paying police cadets and those in field training less than $57,000 as long as once they completed their training their salaries were raised to $57,000. However, that plan did not appear to have the support of the majority of the City Council.
Vaughan also said that the police salaries could be raised to $57,000 without a tax increase. She noted that the City Council effectively raised the tax rate by over 8 cents last year and that generated a huge increase in revenue.
Vaughan said, “I believe there are things in the budget that we cannot necessarily identify that could be cut. We’ve had a huge increase in property tax revenue, especially with the last tax increase, and it was a tax increase. Even though the rate was lower, people paid an awful lot more.”
Hoffmann noted that while she supported the budget, the city had hundreds of millions in deferred maintenance costs that were not being addressed.
Jaiyeoba recommended funding the increase for police starting salaries and raising the minimum hourly wage to $18 by increasing user fees by $800,000 and cutting $200,000 from community economic development funding, $600,000 from participatory budgeting, $2 million from the Greensboro Transit Agency, $250,000 from debt service reduction, $300,000 from economic incentive payments, $250,000 from maintenance and repair and $300,000 from the health insurance contribution.
The City Council is scheduled to vote on the budget at the Tuesday, June 20 meeting.
More waste for east greensboro city council members pet projects. You voted them in….bend over and enjoy.
I will say it again. The City of Greensboro is not on your side.
We’ll be leaving like rats off a sinking ship if this four cent tax increase passes. You’ve found your Delta Council. The new jobs are outside Guilford County and so will the new homes.
Those on fixed income will be forced to follow.
Bye Bye
Got to be a joke when Vaughn is the voice of reason
Our very own Nigerian Prince wins again !
Does Nancy Hoffman live at Well Spring? If so, she should resign! She does not pay Property
Taxes in the amount a normal Home Owner would!
Salt to wound, Well-Spring is reimbursed by NC tax department all sales tax paid during year. What a deal!
Let’s do a protest…l am tired of this bunch of spenders…
I have purchased a countdown clock to when I can move out of Greensboro and Guilford County. With my move I will be leaving a hefty property tax bill, heavy spending at Friendly Shopping Center and mid to high end restaurants, and taking my retirement with me. I have reached my fill of taxes, income redistribution, east side politics, and anti police council. I have a feeling there is a silent majority who feel like me and will voice their opinion with their feet.
LOL….Greensboro City Council, the champions of “The Living Wage” can’t seem to bring themselves to support a “Competitive Wage” for first responders. That just speaks volumes about the priorities of the council but especially of the city manager. This mentality has worked so well in San Francisco, Minneapolis, Portland, Chicago, and Detroit…I predict a similar outcome here in Greensboro.
The people who voted against the tax knew that they would not suffer. They really wanted the tax and knew it would probably pass and they could claim they should be the hero for voting against it.
$600,000 from participatory budgeting? This is the biggest “eyesore” in any budget, that the council would set aside that kind of money for the “do-gooders” in the community to spend on their pet projects. If we have that kind of money to throw around, we don’t need another tax increase.
“It’s time to put a big boy and big girl Bridges on and face the hard truths that we have to deal with for that reason I will support the four cents,” said Tammi Thurm(District 5). WFMY 2 Website
Why don’t you do your job Tammi and look at the budget line by line or at least department by department and see what can be cut? I have put mine on for years by staying in this s&*thole town waiting for things to possibly get better, hoping that there will be enough voters to get a common sense majority on council. I have paid property taxes, watched that money go into east side rabbit holes, watched more money go into council pet projects, watched the homicides increase, told my family members not to go out at night. The hard truth is your budget has gone up 200 MILLION DOLLARS in two years. WTF??? And no city manager, it is not just inflation. It is not just deferred maintenance. It is irresponsible spending. It is a council that sits on the dais like idiots being led my a manager that I guarantee is looking for his next job. It is income redistribution at its best.
Things in the budget that you can’t identify?!? Isn’t knowing what’s in the budget part of your job when voting on the budget? Come on now, Nancy. Do not be so dense.
Step 1) Order Tai to present you a line-by-line budget. Immediately. Make him do it.
Step 2) Read the budget.
Step 3) Make cuts to keep it neutral.
Yes, that will take time, but it will not be difficult. Focus on essential services and infrastructure. Everything else can be cut as needed. So, sorry if you have to cut an arts program or two, or that new intergovernmental liaison that isn’t doing her job might have to go. Any other job or program that does not directly impact essential services or infrastructure simply has to be cut until you are back in the black.
Once again, it has been my pleasure to educate you on how to give orders to subordinates, to read a budget, and to make necessary cuts.