Notes from the TRSSD Meeting*

Traverse Ridge Special Services District. The TRSSD budget was approved, but several SunCrest residents, including OA trustee Barbara Blackmer, raised concerns about the TRSSD. Several Council members and the City’s Finance Director responded with some helpful assurances on the record:

a. the new snow removal equipment will be used only for the TRSSD (which is funded by an extra tax imposed only on residents of SunCrest and The Cove at Little Valley)
b. the new snow equipment and a new salt dome at SunCrest should reduce operating costs for snow removal in the winter
c. the TRSSD surplus will be used only for services in the TRSSD
d. the City will consider reducing tax rates when the TRSSD maintains a contingency reserve (after making the capital expenditures this year for new snow equipment) of about $500,000
e. the City, according to the Finance Director (in response to questions from the Council), essentially covers its excess costs from the TRSSD; there are no additional costs that she recommends recovering from the TRSSD. (This is a useful admission, since we have occasionally heard city councilmen or staff speculate that SunCrest costs the City more in excess costs than it gets from the TRSSD.)
f. the City will examine average property assessments to determine if SunCrest properties tend to have a higher valuation because of their view, and therefore already contribute disproportionately to the City’s share of property tax revenues
g. the City will meet with SunCrest residents earlier in the budget process
h. the City attorney will draft a proposal to create a TRSSD Administrative Control Board including two SunCrest residents to oversee and advise the TRSSD board (which by state law is comprised only of the City Mayor and Council).

Note that the 2008-09 budget assumes lower growth in the TRSSD (it was 5.4% in the past fiscal year, compared to 38.9% the year before) and a lower rate of collections (largely because SunCrest LLC has failed to pay its property taxes). As a consequence, the tax rate has gone up slightly under an automatic state formula.

*Notes prepared by Scott Blackmer.