Grand Chute ends special assessments for road improvements, will rely on property taxes

GRAND CHUTE − The town no longer will levy special assessments on abutting property owners to help pay for road improvements.

Instead, the full cost of road improvements will be paid by the town and funded through property taxes.

The Town Board modified its special assessment policy Tuesday to eliminate all references to roads. The vote was 4-1 with Town Chair Jason Van Eperen and supervisors Jeff Ings, Walt Nocito and Ron Wolff supporting the change and Supervisor Brad Gehring opposing it.

Wolff wanted an even more sweeping change for the town.

"My intentions are to remove all special assessments," he said, "but that's not what's on the agenda."

Special assessments remain in play for other public improvements such as sidewalks, water mains, sanitary sewers and storm sewers.

More: Appleton traffic engineers propose converting College Avenue from four lanes to three

More: Outagamie County Executive Tom Nelson faces two challengers in spring election

Grand Chute's special assessment policy has been under fire for several years.

The town historically has paid for public improvements in part by charging special assessments to abutting property owners who directly benefit from the improvements.

While the practice reduced general property taxes, it sometimes left property owners with bills totaling tens of thousands of dollars or, in rare cases, hundreds of thousands of dollars, resulting in lawsuits. Property owners on West Elsner Road and property owners on Spencer Street have felt the pain in recent years.

"We are not here to harm the residents anymore," Van Eperen told The Post-Crescent. "What was done in the past is in the past. Moving forward, we are doing everything in our power to make sure that things are done fairly and that we can afford fixing our roads."

Gehring acknowledged the hardships created by special assessments. Rather than eliminate them, though, he favored establishing a cap on special assessments.

"The pendulum has gone fully left," Gehring said. "I'm very worried about not assessing anymore and the financial impact that's going to put this town in down the road."

Grand Chute resident Mary Klasen also opposed the elimination of special assessments for roads.

"Why tie your hands?" Klasen asked the board. "It makes more sense to me to keep all potential funding mechanisms on the table."

The board suspended special assessments during the past two years while it worked to find alternative funding. It considered enacting a wheel tax, as Appleton, Kaukauna and New London have. It also looked at a Transportation Assessment Replacement Fee, as Neenah and Buchanan have.

Neither found favor with the board. Van Eperen said a transportation fee initially showed promise, but an Outagamie County judge struck down Buchanan’s fee as an unlawful tax last year. The issue is pending before the state Supreme Court.

Van Eperen said Grand Chute had been spending about $9.2 million on road improvements annually, with $4.6 million coming from property taxes and $4.6 million from special assessments.

With the elimination of special assessments, he said the town plans to cut back on road projects so the annual tax burden remains close to $4.6 million.

Whether the reduction in spending can adequately maintain roads over time remains to be seen.

"Sometimes the trial-and-error method is maybe not the worst thing to do," Van Eperen said. "Let's try this for a couple of years to see if we can keep our roads at a decent level. If we can't, then maybe we need to come back to the table."

Town supervisors previously debated whether to hold a referendum to raise property taxes in excess of state-imposed levy limits to replace the revenue from special assessments, but that's as far as it went.

Van Eperen said no referendum is necessary because the town no longer is seeking to exceed the levy limits for road projects.

Contact Duke Behnke at 920-993-7176 or dbehnke@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter at @DukeBehnke.

SUPPORT LOCAL JOURNALISM: Our subscribers make this coverage possible. Click to see The Post-Crescent's special offers at postcrescent.com/subscribe and download our app on the App Store or Google Play.

This article originally appeared on Appleton Post-Crescent: Grand Chute ends special assessments for road improvements