By Andy Grimm, Post-Tribune
agrimm@post-trib.com
CROWN POINT -- Gary taxpayers are a combined $31 million behind on their 2009 taxes, a shortfall that means the already cash-strapped city, schools and township agencies will have even less money to work with this year.
Tax collections to date, six weeks after the deadline for 2008 pay 2009 bills, totaled just 72 percent for the Gary-Calumet Township taxing unit.
"This is not good news, obviously," said Gary Controller Celita Green, who received a check for $54 million from tax collections, nearly $7 million less than the city had been expecting.
That check would have been even lighter if it hadn't included several million in late payments from previous tax years.
The city government already has cut millions from spending because of shortfalls created by state-mandated tax caps, and Green said the city budget already was calculated based on an 80 percent collection rate.
"This just increases what we will have to cut. We've got to go back to the drawing board, but you get used to it after a while," she said. "It is difficult when you're cutting for tax reform and also for late payments."
Countywide, only Lake Station and New Chicago had collection rates lower than 90 percent.
Whiting collections were recorded at 62 percent, a figure that was artificially low because of a reassessment of some BP property.