During their November meeting, the town of Clymer discussed and approved the 2025 town budget, which is set to include a 8.39% tax rate increase. P-J photo by Sara Holthouse

CLYMER – Clymer residents are looking at an 8.39% tax rate increase under the budget approved recently by Clymer Town Board members.

It’s less than the 12% originally proposed, but will be more than the state’s 2% tax cap. The town’s 2024 tax rate is $4.95 per $1,000 of assessed valuation while the approved budget increases the tax rate to $5.35 per $1,000 of assessed valuation. Riley Enlow, Clymer budget officer, said she proposed a $21,129.45 override in the town’s tax levy for a total 2025 tax levy of $521,756.45.

Some of the largest increases for the town’s budget were found in personnel, health insurance and retirement costs.

“For health insurance, retirement and personnel there was a 10% increase over the 2023 budget for 2024,” Enlow said. “2025 is actually only a 5% increase over the 2024 budget.”

Other larger costs for the town include two highway trucks that were bonded at the same time and require principal payments that are larger than previous years, along with a water bond that is still being paid, and another expected in 2025 for the new water system.

Enlow reported that she decreased multiple areas in order to trim down the budget as much as possible, reducing some appropriations closer to what is actually spent, including line items such as the contingency account, traffic control, garage contractual and park contractual. State retirement has also decreased along with worker’s comp. Property taxes have increased for revenues, but the rest of the town’s revenues pretty much remain the same.

“Our revenues are so, I don’t want to say inconsistent but inconsistent is the best word for it,” Enlow said. “We are not guaranteed the other revenues, and we’re not really guaranteed property taxes. If people don’t pay their taxes we’re operating off of fund balance, and sometimes that happens. Just like with the water district, if people don’t pay their taxes we’re losing money in the water district and that has happened over the last couple of years.”

Town Supervisor Brian Willink added to that, saying revenues in the budget are really just their best guess. Enlow said the biggest revenue that they receive is the sales tax, which depends on what people spend in the county. The state did expect it to grow by 2%, Enlow said, and she did increase that in the budget, but she said they are still budgeting for that to be higher than in previous years in order to balance out the budget and to not use a lot of the fund balance.

“Basically what we’re saying is that this is our best guess,” Willink said. “We try to be realistic, but at the same time conservative, knowing that we’re going to be having a multi-million dollar water project that is going to be a little bit of a drain on not just water resources but highway resources too. So we put some money in there to try and help cushion that but not knowing exactly what we’re going to have for those expenses, it’s tough to know what we’re going to have.”

Willink added that while some money has been put in, it is possible that none will get used, or that more than what was put in there will be used, and they are just trying to plan as best as possible. He also praised Enlow for all of the work she put into the budget, saying he asked her to rework it four times. The town board voted and approved the budget for 2025.