ROCKLAND — Knox County Commissioners in their regularly scheduled meeting on Tuesday, March 12, lowered the county’s mil rate based on the state’s property valuations.

County Administrator Andrew Hart told commissioners that the certified state valuation of Knox County is now $6,781,694.

“That’s up from $6,494,710 the previous year," he said. "The original mil rate allowed would have been .00009248962 up from .00008626603 in 2012, giving the county $132,974 in revenue. That, in turn, is up from $127,347 in 2012, based on the 2 percent maximum allowable by the state.”

Commissioners cited several reasons for lowering the rate, but stopped short from making the rate too low, or removing it all together.

After its approval of the new mill rate of .00009198649, the Commissioners approved a new overlay of $99,731 based on one and a half percent with a unanimous vote.

The rate is expressed as an overlay for the county’s purposes because it is revenue above what the county needs to meet its budget needs. It is surplus to be used in case of budgetary shortfalls.

Mil rates are probably one of the least understood functions of local governments. Municipalities use them to assign a dollar value to property based on that property's estimated value.

In this case a mil, or 1/1000th of a dollar, is equivalent to one tenth of a cent, or 0.001.  To say it a different way, it’s the amount of tax payable per dollar of the assessed value of a property.

The formula takes the value and multiplies it by the mil rate and then divides it by 1,000. This sets the dollar amount owed by the property owner to the governing body issuing the tax.

The term comes from the Latin word "mill," meaning "thousand."

Commissioner Roger Moody raised concerns over the amount.

“I have to question the purpose of overlay and how it is used," he said. "I understand how it is used by municipalities, but it doesn’t seem relevant to me for our purposes because we don’t assess property. It’s good to have a healthy surplus, but I want to be certain we don’t raise more money than we actually need to. Somewhere there’s a balance that says we have a safety margin, but we don’t have an excessive safety margin."

Commissioner Carol Maines questioned taking the mil rate out altogether, but suggested they take reduce it to see its effects.

“I don’t know if I would take it out altogether, but we could take it down to one percent and see how it goes, and then maybe take it lower next year,” she said.

County Finance Director Kathy Robinson expressed the need for the overlay more concisely: “It provides a buffer if something goes wrong throughout the year.  I don’t know if I would eliminate it all together, taking it from two to zero, but lower it and sees where it goes from there.”

The state mandates that two percent is the maximum that can be assessed.

“It does help on cash flow," she said. "Last year it wasn’t as much of a challenge as in previous years, but in past years we can have $500,000 to $700,000 to a million dollars out at one time and it has helped ease the burden during those times."

Commissioner Richard Parent, Jr., expressed his concerns on eliminating the mil rate.

“I don’t like the idea of going into something with empty pockets," he said. "Taking it say to one and a half percent is one thing, but taking it to zero I think is putting us on dangerous ground.”

After recalculating to one and a half percent, Commissioners seemed happy with the new number and agreed it met their needs.


In other business the Commission voted to purchase a new vehicle for the Sheriff’s Office. Bid requests went out to seven vendors and five were received. Commissioners voted to award Quirk Auto Group out of Augusta the winning bid.

Cost for the 2013 Ford Utility Police Interceptor was $26,773 for the complete vehicle, which meant the Sheriff would not need to add lights as an after market purchase.