Streator requests $222,264 more property tax dollars

The Streator City Council will vote Wednesday on a final property tax levy requesting 4.99% more funds than the previous year.

The request is for $4,673,26 and will not require a truth-in-taxation hearing. If approved, the levy will collect about $222,264 more than the previous year.

City Manager David Plyman said the increase was requested as a result of Streator’s growing property tax base.

Plyman said the levy increase allows the city to capture the revenue from this growth without raising the tax rate for homeowners. For example, Plyman said if a home maintains its $100,000 value, the owner may see a reduction of $256.70 in their property taxes, however, some homeowners may see their property values be assessed higher than the previous year.

Plyman also said the increase requested is largely driven by the city’s pension obligations for police and fire services. Despite fully funding these pensions for the past five years, the required contributions continue to rise annually.

“What mainly costs us every year is the police and fire pension request,” Plyman said. “Even though we’ve been funding them at 100% each year, we’re still required to raise even more money than what we provided in the past, and it consumes a lot of the increase.”

Police and fire pensions increased in the last year by $204,573, consuming a high percentage of the levy request.