ANDERSON — The Madison County Board of Commissioners today passed a resolution to increase the county's cumulative bridge fund property tax rate.
The resolution asks the Madison County Council to increase the rate to 10 cents per $100 of assessed value, but the commissioners are certain it won't be approved. In order to raise that rate, the county would have to lower the rate elsewhere, something that's unlikely to happen.
The current levy is about 2.6 cents per $100 of assessed value, which raises about $800,000 per year, according to Chuck Leser, Madison County engineer.
On a house valued at $100,000, the levy raises about $25 annually, he said, which is far less than what's need to keep county bridges in good repair.
Leser estimates the cost to replace, repair, rehabilitate and widen existing bridges in the county is about $34.5 million from 2015 to 2019.
Leser said the county needs $3 million to $4 million per year to maintain the 216 bridges and 219 culverts that range from 6 to 20 feet in length.
John Richwine, president of the commission, said the situation is frustrating.
Raising the bridge fund tax would mean lowering another rate to keep the levy below state property tax circuit breaker requirements.
"I think there should be some way you could fix this," Richwine said.
He suggested one way might be to move the bridge tax outside the maximum property tax restrictions, but that would require an act of the Indiana General Assembly, which he does not think is likely.