Ellijay residents may soon see an unexpected raise in taxes due to a millage rate increase. In a city council budget hearing on September 10th, Ellijay Mayor Al Hoyle announced that the city might have to increase its millage rate due to the decrease in the county’s last tax digest.

According to Hoyle, the county’s last tax digest decreased from $79,000,000 to $71,000,000 which means the city may have to increase its millage rate from 3.203 mills to 3.55 mills.

“We expect it to go up. We really won’t be sure until we get everything in, but it appears right now it will go up, ”

council member David Westmoreland said.

Hoyle also announced during the hearing on Monday that the city’s current 2013 budget is suffering a $56,000 shortfall, meaning that the city’s budget presently has more expenditures than revenue.

With the announcment of the $56,000 shortfall, Hoyle and Westmoreland then told the public that the millage rate would not increase to cover the shortfall, but rather to receive the same tax revenue it already receives. As such, council then immediately began working on balancing its 2013 budget in the budget hearing.

In the hearing, the city said it plans to balance the budget by cutting convention expenses, vehicle expenses and adjusting salaries.

Regarding salaries, council members noticed an overstatement of the amount of salary money projected to Ellijay City Hall and the Ellijay Police Department for the 2013 year. As such, council discussed changes to City Hall’s estimated budget of salaries from $125,000 to $115,000, and also suggested reducing Ellijay’s police department budget by $25,000.

The city council then discussed eliminating city educational convention expenses. Here, council suggested eliminating a yearly Savannah convention trip altogether, along with other proposed travel expenses. In total, both the convention expenses and travel expenses would save the city a total of $10,600.

Lastly, the council entertained the idea of waiting to buy a new police vehicle until 2014 to save the city another $12,000. This, along with fewer projected salaries and cutting convention expenses, would make up the $56,000 shortfall.

The city’s budget will not be official until it is approved at a later city council meeting, but it is apparent that the council is making progress in finalizing its budget. While these changes do not necessarily mean budget cuts for any departments because of overstatements, it does make it necessary that all city departments would have to maintain their budgets.

According to the city council, the changing of proposed salaries for both City Hall and the Ellijay Police Department means that each department could not add any personnel in 2013. Also, the changes to the city’s vehicle expenses means that the police department would have to maintain the vehicles they already have.

It is expected that the city will approve its budget sometime between now and October. According to Ellijay City Clerk Sharon Spivey, the budget must be first be approved before Ellijay can set a new millage rate, and then the millage rate must be advertised for 60 days prior to January 20th, which is the date the city sends out tax bills.

To watch the budget hearing in full, please view the video below.