(KILZA) Richardson County Clerk Mary Eickhoff presented a proposed Fiscal Year 2023-24 budget to the Board of Commissioners during their July 26 meeting.

The proposal was based on the budgets submitted by all department officials and is subject to review by the Commissioners with public hearings tentatively scheduled for September 13th.

The preliminary budget of expenditures is proposed at $21,840,325 including ARPA and Inheritance Tax which is an increase of $512,873 or 2.4 percent from the previous year.

If approved as presented the levy would be 40.1986 cents per $100 of Evaluation, an increase of nearly 2.9 cents per $100 of assessed valuation or a 7.7% increase.

Unknown factors for the next budget at this time, include not knowing what the total valuation for county property will be until August 20. The estimated valuation is $1,664,584,895 which would be a 14 percent increase.

Under the proposed preliminary budget, the property tax requirement would increase by $1,249,000.