In addition to a 2.4-mill additional fire levy, Liberty Township voters will decide the fate of two other levies to support township roads and parks when casting votes this election season.
On the ballot are separate levies at a rate of 1 mill that, if passed, would help the township fund the maintenance of its approximately 101 miles of road as well as park improvements. Each levy would cost voters $35 per $100,000 of the county auditor’s appraised property value and is expected to generate more than $2.7 million annually per levy if successful.
Speaking with The Gazette about the township’s need for additional funding, Liberty Township Administrator Kevin Vaughn detailed the necessary schedule for road maintenance that includes a cycle of a “mill and fill” every 20 years and reconstruction every 40 years.
“We should be investing about $2.762 million annually to do all those things,” Vaughn said. “It’s well beyond what our current financial abilities are. We budget about $250,000 a year for those types of projects, so there’s an enormous gap. That’s as simple as it is. Our roads levy is simply to continue to maintain, pave, and repair our roadways. It’s not for salaries, benefits, or trucks.”
Vaughn said the $250,000 currently budgeted for road maintenance has “continued to deteriorate” due to the rising costs associated with inflation.
“We bought a snow plow truck in 2020 for $140,000,” he said. “That exact same truck today, five years later, in my budget is $240,000. The costs are skyrocketing, and we have no ability to (remedy it).”
Vaughn also cited numbers from the Delaware County Engineer’s Office showing that planing and paving one mile of roadway in 2019 cost $124,300. Today, that same stretch of roadway cost $214,100, a 72% increase. “It’s just becoming unsustainable, and how do we fill that gap?” he asked.
“Fortunately, Liberty Township has been extremely fiscally responsible, but with those types of increases, we’ve gone beyond just being fiscally frugal,” Vaughn added. “It’s too big of a number now. And we’re proud of the fact that we’ve been so fiscally responsible that we’ve never gone to the voters for an outside millage before other than for fire and EMS. For township general operations — roads, general, parks, zoning — we’ve never gone to the voters.”
Currently, just 1% of an individual’s property tax bill goes to the township’s General Fund, which supports everything from township parks, zoning, human resources, communications, elected officials, the finance department, and administration. Two percent of the tax bill funds the roads.
Vaughn noted that unlike paying federal taxes, township residents will be able to see exactly where their money is being spent while also utilizing those same roads every day of their lives.
As for the potential consequences of not securing additional funding for road maintenance, Vaughn didn’t want to come off as an alarmist but did note the issues currently facing the township roads will only grow larger with time.
“We’re not going to do scare tactics,” he said. “We’re not going to say that if you don’t vote for this, your roads aren’t going to get plowed. We’re going to do the absolute best we can with the resources we have available. But what’s going to happen is we’re just going to continue to fall further and further behind. And it gets more expensive the further out we push it. If you push a road project five or 10 years beyond the mill and fill, now you have to do a reconstruction at maybe year 30 instead of year 40. So those costs escalate very quickly. That’s the risk of not properly funding our roadway system.”
Speaking on the parks levy, Vaughn noted Liberty Park was opened in 1990 when the local population was 4,600. Today, that population has grown to 37,500 people, leading to what Vaughn called “enormous pressure and overuse in those facilities.”
“The infrastructure there — the restrooms, the pavilions, the playgrounds — are also 35 years old and nearing the end of their lifecycles,” he said. “We really need to invest in replacing those, and that’s our goal — to replace a lot of that aging infrastructure. But we also want to secure some additional parkland because the township is growing so quickly, and if we don’t acquire that land now, once something is built on it, it’s gone forever. We want to be proactive and forward-thinking to make sure we have the opportunity to secure some green space for the future.”
He added that connectivity is important, and the township wants to be able to continue connecting multi-use paths so community members can commute between homes, hospitals, doctors’ offices, and schools.
Vaughn said he understands inflation is being felt in homes everywhere, and all the township can do is explain the need, why it’s needed, and how the levies compare to nearby townships.
“Yes, we have three levies, and I know every dollar means a lot to everyone right now,” he said. “But the levies are not as significant as many others. And because we have not gone to the voters, when we look at us compared to like-townships or neighboring townships — Genoa Township is at 4 mills and looking at a new levy, Orange Township at 3 mills, Concord Township at 2.65 mills, I think — we are well below what our neighbors are paying.”
Vaughn went on to say, “The challenge that staff has is we have very good property values and very discerning residents who come into these pricey homes and have a demand for good services. We don’t have the opportunity to enact income taxes similar to incorporated communities. That’s a big thing. Living in a township and not having an income tax, that’s a huge deal. That’s an unrecognized value for the most part. So we hope that understanding the value of living in a township and not having an income tax, and the fact that we are the lowest in southern Delaware County in terms of property tax to the township, we hope people can understand that we’re very responsible with their dollars.”
Reach Dillon Davis at 740-413-0904. Follow him on X @DillonDavis56.
