As the budget currently stands, it could mean an increase of up to 30 percent compared to last year.
In his original proposal, Rapid City Mayor Jason Salamun sought a budget of $340 million, nearly $80 million more than last year.
Salamun said this was a groundbreaking change in the budget.
“If you just look at that number, would you wonder if taxes are going up that much for everyone? I want to reassure the public – a lot of this has to do with corporate funds – and we have two significant projects going on at the same time, two expansion projects,” Salamun said.
These projects include an expansion of the Rapid City airport terminal and the wastewater plant.
Salamun described the latter as the largest project in the city’s history.
“We have a significant amount of construction loans for this, a lot of it coming from the state, but also their own capital that they’ve saved up for this,” Salamun said. “This is a project that you’ve approved and it’s going to serve this community for decades and decades to come, and that’s going to be reflected in revenues and expenses as well. So these are not necessarily ongoing operating costs, but they’re a big capital cost at the same time.”
Salamun said overall the increases were less drastic than they appeared on paper.
“The general fund budget was increased by 4.2%,” Salamun said. “While the overall budget increased by tens and millions of dollars due to these significant capital projects, much of that is funds coming to the city from another source and being used for these purposes.”
The second and final reading of the budget is scheduled for September 4.
