Henefer town councilmembers approved the increase Thursday, raising the annual budget from $54,000 to $64,000. The town says a resident with a $600,000 home will pay about $27 more per year.
The additional $10,000 will be deposited into Henefer’s capital improvements fund. Staff member Ty Bailey suggested that could pay for a new public works building or some other public facility.
“I've been here for four or five years now, and it's incredible the amount of stuff that the town gets done with such a limited budget,” Bailey said at Thursday’s budget meeting. “You couldn't operate a business this tight for having no full-time employees and very little revenue.”
Henefer has one of the smallest government budgets in Summit County. The town’s 18.5% tax increase would only increase the average resident’s overall bill 1.4%.
A couple residents spoke out against the property tax hike at the meeting. Mayor Kay Richins acknowledged the concerns and thanked the public for coming.
“We are a bedroom community,” he said. “And so where we don't have businesses and things like that to shoulder the tax burden, a lot of the tax burden, then, it falls upon the citizens. And so it's kind of a Catch-22.”
Two other entities may raise taxes in Summit County this year. Public tax hearings for the two major water districts, Weber Basin and Central Utah, begin on Monday.
