Sycamore lowers property tax levy, plans to add one new employee in 2024

SYCAMORE – At the last meeting of the year, Sycamore City Council members voted in favor of a budget that would add one full-time employee next year and approved a smaller 2023 property tax levy extension.

The 2024 budget, totaling almost $24.4 million, was approved by a 7-0 vote.

According to city documents, the city projected the total revenue and funds transferred into the city’s coffers in 2024 will be $24,378,994, while the total projected expenditures is expected to be $24,375,922.

Both figures are about $1 million more than what the city projects the current eight-month budget would look like if it were done as a 12-month budget. The council approved the 2023 budget in May, as the city transitions to a fiscal year that coincides with the calendar year.

In a subsequent 7-0 vote, City Council members approved the 2023 property tax levy extension request for $3,785,960. The total is similar to what the council originally approved in December 2022 for this year’s property tax levy; however, what city officials now are calling an “administrative issue” led to property owners being overtaxed by almost $120,000.

The 2024 Sycamore property tax levy rate was set at 0.621%, down from the 0.68% tax rate the City Council approved last year. According to DeKalb County documents, Sycamore residents in 2023 were levied property taxes at a 0.703% rate.

The money Sycamore property owners were taxed erroneously this year will be returned via rebate checks by Aug. 1.

City Manager Michael Hall said the taxation error was an “administrative issue” and that it forced the city to reconsider how to fund different departments.

“We really sat down and kind of looked at this. I must say, this all was a group effort,” Hall said. “We’re dropping that from what was collected from $120,000 to what it should be, as a balanced budget.

“And we achieved this balanced budget. This is the part where we all worked together by deferring some capital projects or budget items for one year. Everybody kind of felt the pain of this and agreed to it.”

According to city documents, the city’s full-time employee equivalent will increase by one full-time employee from the current budget in 2024. However, some departments will see cuts.

Next year, the number of full-time equivalent employees working for the Sycamore Fire Department will decrease by one. At the same time, the city’s Community Development Code Enforcement team will lose the equivalent of half a full-time worker.

The Public Works Department will lose the equivalent of one-third of a full-time worker from its water and sewer departments, but it gained the equivalent of two-thirds of a worker for its engineering department.

“I just appreciate the staff for taking a look at everything. Thank you for doing that,” 3rd Ward Alderwoman Nancy Copple said.

Although some departments lost workers, per se, others will gain personnel.

Sycamore police will add the equivalent of half a full-time worker, while the city’s human resources department will gain a full one.

Additionally, Hall said, the city will add an entirely new position in the coming year.

“There will be one position that’s going to be added. That community planner position will help with economic development [and] is going to be filled. That’s in the budget right now as a balanced budget,” Hall said before the council voted.

Second Ward Alderman Chuck Stowe said he was happy with the work city officials put in to balance the budget while rectifying the overtaxation issue.

“I think that it shows that we want to commit to open government and that what we said we were going to do last year we’re doing this year,” Stowe said. “We may have to go up next year – it all depends on what goes on in the city, and I’m not going to predict that. But I think this is a very good job.”