MARSHALL — This month, the Marshall City Council will likely consider a 9.9% levy increase for 2024. At Marshall’s annual “Truth In Taxation” meeting on Tuesday, city staff said they would recommend the increase for the council’s approval.

The Marshall City Council approved a preliminary levy increase of 9.9% in September. The council can approve a final levy lower than the preliminary one. However, director of administrative services E.J. Moberg said, “We will continue to recommend that be the levy that is approved or considered on Dec. 12 – next week’s meeting. That’s when we’re going to bring that one forward.”

On Tuesday, Moberg went over the city’s proposed 2024 budget and levy.

“There’s no action tonight. It’s just to present the budget and take any input regarding that,” Marshall Mayor Bob Byrnes said at the meeting.

The city’s budget process started back in July, Byrnes said. The city council set a preliminary budget and levy in September. The preliminary levy was a 9.9% increase from 2023.

Since September, “We have continued to work towards refining that budget,” Byrnes said.

The city will need to adopt a final budget and levy this month.

In his presentation, Moberg said the proposed 2024 levy was over $8.98 million, which would be an increase of 9.9% from the 2023 levy.

“Going back to our first work session at the end of August, that work session we were looking at a levy impact of over 13.6% of an increase,” Moberg said. “We did get that down, at the council’s direction, to the 9.9% level, which was then approved in September.”

Moberg said a variety of factors impacted the proposed city budget and levy for 2024. Some of the factors included payroll and health insurance costs. “Our health insurance overall went up 7%,” Moberg said. Payroll and related costs were expected to increase over $370,000 for 2024, he said.

Another factor was an increase in debt service funds, for debt that was issued this year. One of the biggest projects was the reconstruction of Third Street and Lyon Street, Moberg said.

There were also variety of factors that would impact city taxes for individual properties, Moberg said. Last year, more property taxes started shifting to residential properties instead of commercial properties. “There was growth again for residential this year, but not as significant,” he said.

Tuesday’s meeting didn’t draw a large audience – only four members of the public attended. But residents said they were concerned that Marshall was considering a 9.9% tax increase for 2024, right after a levy increase 0f 8.1% for 2023.

“So you’re looking at an 18% increase over two years,” one member of the public said. “That seems a little excessive. It really does. And I would hope that something could be done to maybe reduce that in the future.”