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Two Western Clark County communities are seeking new property taxes for public safety forces.
Both the German Twp. Fire Department and Enon Police Department are seeking new funding due to what their leaders described as increased expenses and cuts to state funding.
German Twp. is seeking a new property tax of 1.5 mills for five years for its fire department. If passed, the owner of a $100,000 home would see their taxes increase by $52.50 per year.
Fire Chief Tim Holman said the last time taxpayers were asked for additional money was 2003.
“We’ve never been turned down by the community for a levy,” he said. “We don’t like asking for additional moneys, but we absolutely need it.”
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Holman noted the department has one fire truck that is 30 years old and in “good shape but will eventually need to be replaced,” while its 20-year-old truck needs updates.
“Utilities have gone up and (the cost of) operations have gone up, just because you put ‘fire’ and ‘EMS’ in front of something,” he said. “A lot of our medical equipment that we use, the FDA requires a lot of testing with it, and that gets costly.”
Holman said when the township bought a 1978 modular medic unit in 1978, it cost $32,000. Today, that same unit is $285,000.
“It’s 30 some years, but still, the cost is just outrageous,” he said.
According to Holman, the township has downsized its medic units to save money, purchasing two smaller units at $135,000 each.
“We’re able to get two units for the price of one mid-sized unit,” he said, adding that the smaller units are easier and cheaper to maintain and maneuver, and give a better ride.
The increase would also take care of staffing as well, Holman added. The township had 1,417 runs in 2015 and is right at 1,500 already this year, with two months to go.
“We don’t have any plans to increase staff at this time, but if run times continue to increase, we may have to,” he said.
Enon is seeking a new levy for 5 mills for five years for its police department. The owner of a $100,000 home would see their taxes increase by $174.96 per year with levy approval.
>>RELATED: Enon proposes new 5-mill police levy
“It’s been awhile, approximately 10 years ago, since we asked for new money,” Enon Mayor Tim Howard said. “Back then, several grants had dried up and we weren’t able to keep up. But (the voters) overwhelmingly supported it.
“Now we’re back in the same situation again,” he continued. “None of us really like it, it is just the reality. Enon is a safe town. If we are going to continue to have a strong police force, we are going to have to have this. Not having a strong presence is something we want to avoid.”
Enon Police Chief Lew Wilcox said the cost of health care is skyrocketing, along with increases in training costs and liability insurance.
“The police department has been supplemented by (Enon’s) general fund to the tune of $200,000 per year,” he said. “Now, with the cutbacks from the state, we need that levy to make up these differences.”
Two of the town’s four full-time positions are now open, and by Dec. 1 two of its six part-time positions will be vacant. Wilcox said the difficulty of trying to find quality officers to fill those openings at the rate of $16 an hour full-time and $10 part-time is becoming a reality. He added that passage of the levy would assure that those positions would be filled.
“If we don’t get it, I don’t know what we’ll do,” he said. “I’ve got good people, but I can’t keep them. So we’ve got to get our pay up a little bit. We cannot even compete with other departments. The cost of everything is just going out of sight.”
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