St. Gabriel rolls forward taxes

ST. GABRIEL — The City Council unanimously decided to roll forward the city’s millage rates Thursday night to generate approximately $2.6 million during the 2012-13 budget year.

Councilman Melvin Hasten was absent from Thursday’s meeting.

The city held a public hearing to discuss two resolutions regarding rolling forward the millage rates, not exceeding the maximum amount authorized for the upcoming tax year.

Officials said the action doesn’t require voter approval.

During reassessment years such as 2012, parish and municipal taxing bodies are required by law to “roll back” their tax rates to levels that will generate the same revenue as the previous year.

Assessors must reassess property values in their parishes every four years.

When values increase, taxing authorities are asked to roll back their millage rates, or they have the option to keep them the same, called “rolling them forward,” to generate additional revenue.

On Thursday, the council adopted resolutions rolling the city’s 16.84-mill rate forward instead of letting the rate roll back to 16.69 mills, Tax Collector Linda Gibson said.

Gibson told council members that if they hadn’t adopted the “adjusted” rate, the city would have missed $23,000 in revenue.