Some voters who are being asked by the City of Burlington to raise their own property taxes in order to renovate the US Bank Building for use as a Police Department are scrutinizing the City’s plans, and demanding to know more.
At the upcoming November 3rd general election, 60% of Burlington voters are needed to approve a $4 million loan agreement intended to be used to purchase and renovate the US Bank building.
The US Bank building, if approved by voters, will be the new location for the Burlington Police Department. The current building that houses the department was built in the 1880’s and has major infrastructure deterioration.
While the general consensus does seem to agree that the current police station needs to be vacated, rising property taxes have residents anxious about voting for yet another tax increase.
Burlington resident Karla Sherwood says she wants to see more detail about the city’s plans for the facility, a sentiment shared by a lot of residents, she called in to the KBUR Talk Show on Thursday:
“I’m very, very thankful that they’re going to use an existing building–but I don’t think they need $4 million to revamp it,” Sherwood told hosts Steve Hexom and Rob Sussman, “I want to see the figures, I want to see everything.”
Burlington Mayor Shane McCampbell who has been optimistic about voter confidence, also called in to respond to criticism regarding the $4 million cost for a new and improved police station.
“We are working on a plan right now as we move forward on this that we can present so that people can see exactly what they’re going to be paying for, we’re not trying to build a taj mahal were just trying to take advantage of this opportunity,” Said Mayor Shane McCampbell “and I I’ve been using this analogy I know that ‘the city only has a quarter and its going to cost us a dollar to build this police station, but its best to pay that dollar now than five dollars tomorrow”
The Burlington City Council has evaluated in the past several other locations, including building a new facility on the corner of Curran and Agency, moving into the former Tom’s Market building, or demolishing the current building and building a new one. All of those options were assessed to be more expensive than the Us Bank option.
Mayor Pro-Temp Becky Anderson says that the city will use funds from a $1 million loan payoff from the company that currently owns Newberry Village apartments, as well as some reserve funds in order to keep the renovation costs as low as possible.
The new debt would raise city property taxes by 37 cents per $1,000 in assessed valuation on a 20 year bond.
