By Meg Peters
Review Co-Editor
The Lake Orion Village Council unanimously approved a motion to grant the village attorney and administration the authority to compose ballot language for a village-wide police millage that would appear before village voters on the November 2016 general election ballot.
The ballot question will only be available to the Village of Lake Orion voters of Precinct 2 located at Blanche Sims Elementary.
If Lake Orion residents turn it down, the village will have a second opportunity to pose the ballot question again during the May 2017 election.
Village Manager Darwin McClary recommended that the police millage not exceed 2.9885 mills, the same amount levied in the township for its police services, to partially fund the Lake Orion Police Department.
A 2.9885 mill levy would generate about $354,000 based on the taxable value of village properties according to 2016 figures. The Downtown Development Authority (DDA) would capture about $71,000 of the taxes, and return the money to the village for police services in the DDA district.
The Lake Orion Police Department (LOPD) has a budget of about $815,000, according to current figures.
If voters pass the police millage in November the collection would cover the July 1, 2017 to June 30, 2018 fiscal year.
Council instructed administration to prepare two drafts of the first ever Lake Orion police millage.
The first draft calls for a two-year extension, which would be renewed with voter approval during the mid-term election held in 2018. The second draft calls for a four-year term of which would be renewed during the general election of 2020.
“It would be a recurring cycle, and we would try to time it with an election that is already scheduled so we are not incurring special election additional costs,” Village Manager Darwin McClary said.
The decision for the village to seek its own millage was part of a negotiation reached between the Village of Lake Orion and Orion Township. The negotiation, that the township would agree to levy and collect the village of Lake Orion’s portion of the township wide police millage for one more year, required that the village levy its own police millage after the one-year contract expired.
The separation of the taxing authorities comes at the end of a 24-year relationship of the township levying the village’s police millage for free.
As part of the one-year contract the Village of Lake Orion agreed to pay $5.50 for each tax parcel—about $8,250 for 1,500 parcels—within village boundaries.
Also changed in the one-year police millage contract is the requirement for the village to rollback its millage rate by Headlee Rollback maximum of 1.98 mills as was previously required by the joint police millage agreement.
New language was also added to ensure the township would not collect any taxes from village residents after the one-year contract expired.
All township and village residents will vote on the one-year contract police millage renewal in the August 2016 primary election. After the one year the millage would separate into a township police millage, to fund the Oakland County Sherriff’s Department police services contract, and a village wide police millage to support the Lake Orion Police Department.
“We would have liked to work this out for another four years, but we’re satisfied with what we came up with,” McClary said.
Village Council must finalize the ballot question by August 16 to meet the November 2016 deadline.