Assembly follows through by lowering mill levy

Having covered our share of budgets, we can honestly say it’s been a very long time since we’ve seen the level of reduction that the Mat-Su Borough managed to achieve this week.

We are cautious not to use the word “cuts,” because a hefty portion of the money that supplanted tax revenue — and thus reduced the tax rate — came from three sources, including:

• the borough’s own reserve funds, which were reduced to the statutory minimum;

• the state’s revenue-sharing program;

• and the federal government, which handed over stimulus funds.

None of those three moves required the borough to cut anything it had planned to pay for.

We understand the logic here. Borough residents who don’t believe the borough should build up a savings account with tax funds have a point. And the assembly members could have easily used that state and federal money to pay for goodies for their constituents.

Dropping the amount of taxes borough residents have to pay by a full point, lowering the mill levy from 9.9 to 8.9, is something borough assembly members are right to crow about.

They said they were going to do this, and followed through to do what they promised.

The mayor, likewise, did exactly what he said he was going to do. Mayor Larry DeVilbiss said he was going to try to veto matching funds for state grants to local nonprofits, and indeed he tried. The assembly overrode him.

We would side with the assembly with this one. The nonprofits on the list provide a host of services — housing residents displaced by fire or disaster, providing food for the hungry — that simply are not replicated elsewhere. The borough needs these nonprofits as much as the nonprofits need the borough.

What the borough has achieved, in our view, is a balance between the community’s desire for reduced spending and a recognition that there are essential services that need to be provided.

This is most clear in the emergency services budget, where money was shifted around to make room for six full-time paramedics who will staff a pair of borough ambulances around the clock.

Paramedics, you may well know, are the most highly trained emergency medical responders available. That the borough will be much more likely to send one to take care of patients at car wrecks and other emergencies should give all of us peace of mind.

We would caution readers, however, not to get used to this lower tax rate. Assemblywoman Cindy Bettine warned that if the assembly makes a habit of drawing from those reserves its bond rating would suffer. We don’t think future administrations will want to put the borough’s ability to cheaply borrow money in jeopardy. Likewise, state matching funds aren’t always available, nor will federal stimulus dollars.