St. Clair Shores voters will decide on infrastructure millage

St. Clair Shores voters will decide on a millage increase for roads, parking lots, alleys and street lighting in August.
(MACOMB DAILY FILE PHOTO)

St. Clair Shores residents will decide on Aug. 8 if they want to replace an expiring 1.64 millage that funds residential road repairs and street lighting with a 2 mill levy that will expand the previous millage to include work on city alleys and parking lots.

The city’s street repair millage has been in place for many years and in 2014 was increased from 1 to 1.25 mills to accommodate the addition of street lighting. In 2019 it was bumped to 1.75 mills.

The proposed millage would be in place for five years and is estimated to produce $3.9 million in collections the first year.

Those funds could be used for residential street repairs, alleys, city parking lot repairs and construction, street lighting and related sewer repairs and construction.

Funds collected from the current millage cannot be used for alleys or parking lots.

“We have been able to get a lot accomplished with this millage and we want to keep ahead of these kinds of repairs as best we can,” said St. Clair Shores Mayor Kip Walby at the March 18 City Council meeting where ballot language for the proposal was approved. “We don’t like to increase people’s taxes, but this has had a very positive impact on our city.”

A mill equals $1 of tax on every thousand dollars of taxable value. If a property’s taxable value is $100,000, one mill equates to $100 in tax liability.

Councilpersons Candice Rusie and John Caron voted in opposition of the ballot language for the millage proposal because they do not think money levied from this millage should be used to repair or replace city parking lots.

“I think the most important thing is that we are letting the people vote on the proposal,” said Counilman David Rubello. “They will either tell us they want it or they don’t want it, but it is up to the voters to decide.”