Aurora – Money for libraries, street sweeping and park maintenance could be slashed if residents of the state’s third-largest city don’t pass a $10.4 million annual property-tax hike, officials said.
The City Council tonight is likely to approve putting a tax increase on the Nov. 1 ballot that would cost homeowners $80 annually on a $250,000 house.
The revenue would be used for public-safety issues, such as more police officers, additional firefighters and two fire stations. Without the increased revenue, other programs will be cut to fund public safety, officials said.
The council also may ask voters to allow the city to get out of a mandate that forces hiring two police officers for every 1,000 residents – reducing the ratio to 1.7 officers per 1,000 residents.
Both issues are ways around an anticipated 2006 budget shortfall of between $8 million and $13 million, budget officer Mike Trevithick said.
Without more money, the city will have to pare back some of its services, he said.
“We will have to cut deep into libraries and parks,” he said. Expect cuts for things like “street sweeping and sidewalk repair, the recreation budget, anything that is viewed as discretionary.”
The City Council will make those tough choices when it puts together the city budget in the fall. If the tax hike passes, some of their cuts can be restored.
Not many city leaders believe the property-tax measure will pass, though most still favor giving the people the vote.
“It gives people of Aurora a say,” Mayor Ed Tauer said. “That doesn’t necessarily mean we think people will vote for it.”
Two advisory groups told the council to avoid a ballot measure. Councilman Ryan Frazier, who opposes putting the matter on the ballot, commissioned a poll in which nearly 6,000 respondents were split over whether they would support a public-safety tax hike.
Officials have said one of the biggest city expenses is hiring new officers to conform to the 2-per-1,000 mandate that voters passed in 1993. However, the city has never quite reached the intended ratio.
At the end of 2004, the city had 584 commissioned officers, which includes everything from patrol officers and narcotics detectives to desk sergeants and the chief of police. That amounts to 1.95 officers per 1,000 residents.
Denver, Colorado’s most populous city, has 1,410 sworn police, roughly 2.5 per 1,000 residents. (That includes 100 officers at Denver International Airport.) And Colorado Springs, the second-largest city, has 668 officers, or 1.7 officers per 1,000 residents.
Next year the city must hire at least 24 new officers, and the program will be $10 million in the hole.
The 0.25 percent sales-tax increase that was supposed to fund the program hasn’t kept up because Aurora’s population has exploded, demanding more and more officers. City officials estimate Aurora’s population grows at a rate of 1.75 percent a year. By the end of 2005, 303,325 people are expected to call the city home.
Councilwoman Kathy Green tonight is expected to propose a ballot measure to cut the required number of officers to 1.7 per every 1,000 residents.
“Since we have never technically achieved the 2-per-1,000, it makes sense to ask voters if that is something they would like to continue,” she said.
Frazier’s poll results said people won’t support cutting the 2-per-1,000 program. Sixty percent of respondents said they wanted the program to remain.
Tauer understands.
“I’ve heard people tell me they pay too much in taxes,” he said, “but I’ve never had a single citizen say, ‘I think we have too many cops.”‘
Staff writer Jeremy Meyer can be reached at 303-820-1175 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com.