Rural Linn County residents likely to see tax relief, road, conservation spending on LOST ballot

Rural Linn County residents will probably vote May 3 on using their share of a penny's worth of sales tax to cut their property taxes while substantially boosting spending on rural roads and conservation projects.

"That's a pretty good deal," District 4 Supervisor Brent Oleson, R-Marion, said of his proposed ballot language. "It's a win-win-win all around."

Supervisors have until Feb. 25 to adopt a ballot for voters in unincorporated sections of the county, but they expressed general agreement this morning for Oleson's proposal.

Under the plan, if voters across the county approve extending the present one-cent sales tax for another 20 years, half the share going to unincorporated areas would be spent on secondary roads, and 25 percent each to property tax relief and conservation programs, including watershed management, parks, and trails.

Rural property tax savings are "going to more than pay for any penny (in sales tax)," said Oleson, who said he consulted Farm Bureau leaders and other rural residents while devising the proposal.

The owner of a $200,000 rural home would see about $100 in property tax savings, according to an estimate by county staff. The tax on agricultural property valued at $450,000 would drop by about $320.

The proposed allocation would generate $2 million to $3 million a year for secondary road maintenance and construction.

The rural ballot would include the same 20-year collection period that will appear on Cedar Rapids' version. The tax could be ended earlier in rural areas by a majority vote by the county board.

While voters in unincorporated areas comprise about 10 percent of the county's population, about 17 percent of sales-tax revenue, collected mostly in cities, goes to those areas under the state's formula - about $5 million currently. If rural voters vote down the tax but it passes elsewhere, rural residents wouldn't see a share.

The ballot doesn't address flood protection for the county courthouse and jail on May's Island, although supervisors have expressed a desire to that question addressed by Cedar Rapids. District 2 Supervisor Linda Langston, D-Cedar Rapids, said that cost would be more appropriately met through bonds, "to get that spread among all our county citizens," not just the rural voters.

Oleson noted the county has already bonded for several rebuilding projects. He said Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett's proposed Growth Reinvestment Initiative, which calls for the city and county to keep at least a share of its future growth in sales-tax revenues for flood projects, would be a better way to fund major flood-protection work. The state Leglislature must pass the GRI.