Council approves 4% increase in city taxes for $1.81M budget

The city of Carlton was expected to adopt a 4.01-percent levy increase following its Truth in Taxation hearing Dec. 4.

The taxable levy on the city’s $1.81 million budget for 2025 rose to $516,367, up from $496,457 in 2024, accounting for the 4-percent increase.

The city council met Dec. 5 for a special meeting aimed at finalizing the numbers prior to this week’s hearing.

“We went through it line by line to see where we can make changes and save money,” mayor Mike Soderstrom said following the Dec. 5 meeting. “People can ask themselves, ‘Has your budget at home gone up more than 4 percent?’ Basically, running a small city is like your budget at home.”

At the meeting Dec. 5, the council adopted a modest flight of raises for city staff, and Soderstrom noted it as an effort at cost control. Instead of a 3-percent cost-of-living raise, staffers took less, led by fire chief Derek Wolf and city administrator Carol Conway each taking 50-cent hourly increases versus 3-percent raises, which would have amounted to more than $1-per-hour increases. As a tradeoff, the department heads took an additional annual week of vacation.

“We’re trying to be creative,” Soderstrom said.

General fund expenditures ($662,367) — salaries, street maintenance — made up the largest portion of the 2025 budget, followed by fire department ($144,665), 2021 bond payment ($133,998), and bond payments for the fire and ambulance buildings ($32,558 and $48,838).

The city also put $81,000 total into separate capital accounts for future fire and city expenditures, to be used on items such as vehicle and equipment replacement. The fire department is setting aside money for new self-contained breathing apparatuses, vehicle extraction tools and vehicle replacement. The city is saving for a replacement public works vehicle, along with replacement lawn mowers.

“For us to be responsible about planning for the future, we have to think about what expenditures we’re going to have,” Soderstrom said.

The city also capped its charitable giving at $10,000 for 2025. The city uses charitable gambling revenues to help support local causes as well as fund its playground. The city has regularly given funds to organizations such as the school district, VFW and community education; charitable donations soared to $19,000 last year.

“We get hit up … quite a bit,” Soderstrom said.

“We’re about the only community dispersing these funds — everyone else keeps it for their parks and rec,” Conway said.

The cap means anything raised over $10,000 in charitable earnings — the city made more than $15,000 last year — will go to new playground equipment.

The city is doing as well as expected, Soderstrom said.

“Would I like to keep it at zero? Absolutely,” Soderstrom said of the levy increase. “But everybody running their homes or businesses, they can’t do it. We have no control over what Minnesota Power charges us, WLSSD, the internet — all of these things go up every year and we have to pay for them, just like everybody else does.”