Snohomish County Councilmember Nate Nehring has proposed a budget amendment to eliminate the 8% general property tax levy increase proposed by County Executive Dave Somers for the 2025/2026 biennial budget. The amendment eliminates the increase to the general property tax levy and makes corresponding cuts to expenditures in the budget, Nehring’s office said in a news release.
“Taxpayers in Snohomish County have been burdened by ever increasing taxes in recent years,” Nehring said. “We can balance our county budget without tax increases while continuing to provide essential services our constituents expect. My amendment does just that by identifying cuts in unnecessary county spending to eliminate the need for a tax increase. Taxpayers have had to tighten the belt with regard to their own personal budgets and government ought to do the same.”
Snohomish County Executive Dave Somers presented his proposed 2025-26 biennial budget to the Snohomish County Council in September. It is the first biennial county budget, and Somers said it focuses on sustaining core services and avoiding cuts to staff or programs, even as costs outpace government funding and federal recovery dollars end. The proposed budget including all funds is $3.065 billion for the next two years, and the proposed general fund budget is $700 million.
According to Nehring, Somers’ proposed 2025/2026 budget increases the county’s general property tax levy by the state-allowed 1% each year as well as taking banked capacity from previously deferred tax increases for a total increase of 8% over the biennium. Nehring said his amendment removes budget increases over the previously budgeted levels and discretionary spending not connected to essential county government functions.
Nehring’s amendment will be considered during the council’s budget deliberations currently scheduled for 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 13. You can watch the meeting via Zoom here.
Finally someone who understands but I doubt it will pass government is just to greedy. We need more people like him in government then just maybe we will stand a chance against the tax monster
Please do not raise taxes, with gas and food prices too many living pay check to pay check will suffer. As a homeowner I have to live within a budget and expect my local government to also. Where am I going to find an extra 8 %, we live on a fixed income.
Property taxes are very complex so I would like to explain that this proposed increase only applies to the county’s portion of the taxes. The county’s portion is approximately 7%. Still too much of an increase for many but not as bad as possibly thinking that the increase would be 8% of your total property taxes.
A little here and a little there ADDS up to thousands. Please trim the sails. The ROI on my property taxes is NON EXISTANT
They already collect more taxes from the assessment increases that are way over 1% thanks to property appreciation beating even inflation. This is just greed.
When property values go up the tax rate goes down to stay within the 1%.
I don’t know how it works exactly and who all the money goes to but my property taxes are 30% more than they were about 5 years ago you could say the county didn’t get it or the city or state or schools but somebody got it. City wants to drop fire on us that is 800 the county wants 8% I don’t know 40 bucks how about the hospital the library the schools the transit authority and the state they all want increases too. Sorry but the pie is only so big the rate of increase regardless of where it is coming from or going to far exceeds any normal rate of increase over recent time but yet it isn’t enough? When is enough, enough, when people are forced to sell their homes because they can’t afford to live there anymore or worse because the cost of living has pushed them out of housing, when is it?
It is only the non-voter-approved taxes that are limited to the 1% annual increase. The voter-approved school taxes usually increase by more than 1%. And your taxes will go up by more than the 1% when your property’s assessed value increases by a greater percentage than the average for your city.
So you would approve tax increases between city county and state just in property taxes of at least 5% of people’s gross incomes? Add in increases for everything else. Makes it sound like you prefer to make the people suffer just so government is well funded? Sorry if I ain’t buying. Glad to know the amount of taxes you pay has no effect in your quality of life, sounds like my ability to survive is going to be crushed by government taxation in the near future thanks for your support.
Jim:
Is your comment referring to mine? If so, all I tried to do is to somewhat explain how the property tax system works. I have not passed judgement on any increases.
My apologies Ron thanks for helping us understand better. I am just frustrated I had to beg and borrow to pay the property tax and the thought of higher taxes isn’t something I am looking forward to.
Ron, thanks for your explanation.
Jim, ease up on Ron for heaven’s sake. I don’t always agree with Ron, nor he with me, but overall he has been an all too scarce voice of reason and a seeker of tax fairness we should all respect. If you want to get a quick migraine, study and try to understand property tax levy’s and how they work. Ron is one of only about four people I know who really have any idea of how this stuff works. Trying to distill this tax thing down as simple as possible, I’ve come to the conclusion that we are turning to property taxation too much because it’s becoming the only game in town to finance local government. Indeed there is a measure on the ballot right now to protect excessive local wealth from any sort of fair taxation. You can’t tax rich people because they create minimum wage jobs (in theory anyway) and you can’t tax poor people (other than regressive sales taxes on just about everything) because they don’t have any excess wealth or much net worth, so what is left to tax? Property. Add gross mismanagement and waste in local governments and you end up where we are now.