Whitefish approves budget with tax bump

Whitefish City Council approved the final budget for fiscal year 2025 at its regular meeting last week and prepared to send thank you notes for generous donations to the city. 

Whitefish’s fiscal year 2025 total budget totals $53,542,830. Compared to the prior fiscal year, 2025 expenditures are expected to increase $3,152,669, or about 7.5%. The increase in expenditures is mostly due to an increase in personnel costs and a significant increase in capital expenditures, according to city staff.  

On Aug. 5, the city received its taxable value from the Department of Revenue. It grew by 2.47% from last year, so one mill will increase from about $79,000 in fiscal year 2024 to about $81,000 in fiscal year 2025. 

The preliminary budget projected 7.75 property tax mills and the final budget is 8.75 mills. The increase means a residential property with a market value of $800,000 will see an annual increase in property taxes of about $94. 

“We did add one mill to make sure that all positions at the city are adjusted to at least 90% of market for wages, as we’ve had lagging wages compared to the market over the last few years,” Whitefish City Manager Dana Smith said. “Of those 8.75 mills, 2.52 mills are due to the decrease in property tax relief.” 

She said the remaining 6.23 mills are necessary to fund wages, keep up with operating costs and fund the Local Government Review this year. 

"I want to be clear that this does not mean just because we’re doing an increase this year that we won’t do increases in the future as that revenue changes, we will have to adjust,” Smith added. 

A pay increase of 8.5% for most employees is budgeted for fiscal year 2025. 

Smith’s report states that Whitefish has provided reduced levies and assessments to relieve property taxpayers for four of the last five years. When property taxes were increased, the increase was small and in the following year, taxes were decreased further than the increase.  

The report states the city was able to provide significant reductions in property taxes and assessments over the past five years due, in part, to considerable increases in additional property tax relief from resort tax collections, growth of investment earnings and an increase in the city’s taxable value due to newly developed property. 

The final budget says resort tax collections for fiscal year 2024 were $44,682 less than expected and that the shortfall was offset by higher‐than‐expected investment earnings of $61,870.  

It is expected the city will see a decrease of about $144,000, or ‐5.97%, in property tax relief for fiscal year 2025. 

Overall capital spending in fiscal year 2025 is projected to increase by about $3 million compared to the prior year. The increase in capital spending is mostly due to project costs for the South Water Storage and Production project. 

WHITEFISH PARKS and Recreation Director Maria Butts received authorization from the council to accept a generous land donation that will extend Riverwood Park. 

Billie Wartnow owns land just outside of city limits, but a portion of her parcel is located across the Whitefish River, adjacent to Riverwood Park. According to the staff report, Wartnow has often seen people access the river from her property and she realized the land would be a significant amenity for the community. 

“She has committed to donating the land to the city for the use of a public river access point,” Butts said. “The Park Board voted to honor the generous donation by naming the donated area Wartnow Landing.” 

The council voted unanimously to authorize acceptance of the donation and asked Butts to draft a thank you letter to Wartnow. 

Whitefish Public Works Director Craig Workman reported that Stack Financial Management made a donation to the city. 

“(They) donated a rather expensive, very complicated generator to the city of Whitefish,” Workman said. “It’s a three-phase, 277-volt generator that we’ll actually be able to use at a number of our different lift stations.” 

Workman is drafting a thank you note to Stack Financial owners Jim and Lisa Stack.