Porter County 2017 Budget Order Issued

The Indiana Department of Local Government Finance has issued Porter County’s 2017 budget order, containing the approved budgets, levies, and certified tax rates for taxing units throughout the county.

Some highlights of this year’s budget order:

• Tax rates will decrease in all but two of Porter County’s 30 taxing districts.
• The tax rate to fund county government will drop from 0.4394 (43.94 cents) to 0.4385 (43.85 cents). This is the fourth year in a row that the county government’s tax rate has declined.
• Thirteen taxing units – including Porter County government – qualified for an abbreviated state review of their budgets due to the proposed property tax levies submitted.
• The budget order continues to show that Porter County has four school systems with tax rates exempt from the property tax caps, as approved by voters in a referendum. The school systems with these referendum rates are Valparaiso, Duneland, Union, and Boone Township schools.

Porter County Auditor Vicki Urbanik noted that the DLGF has through Feb. 15 of each year to issue the budget orders throughout the state.

“With the tax rates now certified, the County Auditor’s Office will proceed without delay with this year’s tax bills. In the coming weeks, our office will prepare the tax abstract, publish the annual tax rate chart, and calculate the bills,” Urbanik said.

The first installment of property tax bills will be due on May 10.

The DLGF will post the 2017 budget orders online at www.in.gov/dlgf; click on “County Specific Information.” The link to the state’s Budget Status Map is: www.in.gov/dlgf/files/2017_Cert_Status.pdf