La Crosse council to get first look at mayor’s $69-million budget

Also looking at $50,000 discrimination
lawsuit among many other things

La Crosse’s city council looks to be busy tonight.

The council had to postpone last week’s meeting because of a scheduling error. Now, on top of voting on a $50,000 discrimination lawsuit, dissolving the public works dept., merging the libraries, turning a historic building into a B&B and many other items, the council will also be looking at Mayor Tim Kabat’s 2017 budget plan.

The $69 million proposal is down more than $2 million from a year ago. 

When Kabat became mayor three years ago, many people didn’t expect much decrease in either spending or taxing during his term.  

Kabat, however, is offering a budget that cuts taxes .3 percent from last year and will propose a spending plan that’s 4 percent lower than the budget he inherited.

“There was some skepticism about whether we were going to see a lot more spending, a lot of increase in our levy,” Kabat said. “And, again, I’m very pleased with the fact that we’ve worked very creatively with the council over the years.”

The tax levy is also down slightly, but the mayor says there’s room for it to go higher.

“If we takes last year’s levy and apply the net new construction, which would allow us to increase the levy by about $535,000,” Kabat explained, “we could increase the levy by over $600,000.”

Kabat says flood control, road construction and the funding of essential city services are all covered in the new operating budget.

Kabat also wants to establish an environmental planner and hire an IT expert for city hall, in exchange for eliminating the public works dept.