Vermont’s largest city is struggling to find a way to pay the bills without busting the bank.
The property tax supports just about half the budget in Burlington. But city officials say taxpayers can’t keep up with demand. Their taxes have already gone up 50% over the past 7 years.
And while that’s similar to what a lot of towns are dealing with, the problem is more challenging in Burlington, where there isn’t much new development in the city to boost the grand list of taxable property.
Jonathan Leopold is Burlington’s Chief Administrative officer, and chaired a task force to deal with the problem. He spoke with VPR’s Mitch Wertlieb about the situation.