The Greene County board of supervisors hopes that rural residents will see the benefits of the 1-cent local option sales and service tax (LOSST) and vote to renew it at the Nov. 4 general election. All county officials stress that it’s not a new tax, but a renewal of an existing tax. The funds now must be used for rural property tax relief and “rural betterment.” Under the language of the renewal, the funds must be used for rural property tax and “any other lawful use.”
The tax brings in between $350,000 and $360,000 per year. About half of that is allocated to the secondary roads department for maintenance of county roads. The sheriff’s department funds a vehicle purchase each year with LOSST funds, and the conservation department receives $5,000 a year for the Raccoon River Valley Trail.
The other half of the LOSST revenue goes directly to rural property tax relief. County property owners pay a rural levy above the general levy paid by all property owners. Because of the LOSST revenues, the rural levy rate has decreased from a rate more than 3.9 (cents per thousand dollars of taxable valuation) to 3.15.
The “any other lawful use” is new language in the purpose statement for the tax. Supervisor Dawn Rudolph explained that the supervisors don’t plan to change how they’ve used the funds in the past. “Our main intention is to keep it for the rural aspect of our infrastructure. But if there would ever be an emergency of some sort, where we would need some extra funds, we would have that option,” she said. “We plan to continue to do what we’ve done in the past,” she added.
The renewal would be effective January 1, 2017 to June 30, 2027.
