In the final week before Anne Arundel County is required to pass its fiscal 2024 budget, County Executive Steuart Pittman’s office added pay raises for librarians and school nurses.
Additions to the budget presented to the County Council Wednesday included $530,000 in funding for Anne Arundel County Public Library staff salaries and $130,000 for school nurse salaries which will amount to a 1.25% increase.
A $485,000 increase to the library system was in the original proposal, and will now total around $1 million. The additional funds would move the library system one third of the way to achieving salary parity with surrounding jurisdictions which would cost around $3 million, said Skip Auld, the library system’s CEO.
Of the library system’s 285 employees, Auld said 240 will receive raises with this extra funding. While this increase will average out to roughly $4,200 raises per employee, raises may range from a few hundred dollars to as much as $20,000 based on the individual’s experience level and position.
“It’s not everything but it shows the county executive and County Council, assuming they’re all in favor of this, are really trying to help us out here and get us where we should be,” Auld said.
Another proposed addition to the budget includes $130,000 for the salaries of school nurses which will work out to a 1.25% raise.
The county has struggled to hire school nurses, a position with high turnover in recent years. Of the 350 school health staff members the county employs, 139 have left so far this school year, according to the health department. Last year 109 left throughout the year.
Funding of about $2 million was also included for five new police officers and five new police sergeants. The County Council will vote on these changes Wednesday, the same day they vote on the final budget, said Budget Officer Chris Trumbauer.
As the budget underwent changes over the past few weeks since Pittman proposed it to the council May 1 funds that were deemed unnecessary for their original purpose were moved around to meet other demands like librarian, school nurse and teacher raises.
A large chunk of potential savings found by the county auditor totaling around $3 million was approved by the County Council Tuesday and is slated to go toward raising starting teacher salaries to about $58,000. The raise will help Anne Arundel stay on top of state requirements created by the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, education overhaul legislation that mandates all teachers’ salaries start at $60,000 across the state by fiscal 2026.
Proposed changes to the budget also include removing Provinces Park in Severn as the location of the West County Swim Center. The community has contested the plan for the past year and the area’s council member Pete Smith, a Severn Democrat, has vowed to do all he can to ensure the swim center is not built at the park that is currently used for recreation like basketball and soccer.
Smith has previously said he thinks there is land owned by Fort Meade that would be more suitable for the swim center, however representatives from the Department of Recreation and Parks already did an assessment of all viable locations and found Provinces Park best.
At a budget meeting on Tuesday, Anne Arundel County Council Republicans failed to eliminate the tax increases Pittman proposed in the budget.
Republicans Nathan Volke, of Pasadena, Amanda Fiedler, of Arnold, and Shannon Leadbetter, of Crofton, argued the tax burden was too high for residents right now as inflation continues to be untenable. They sponsored amendments to reduce Pittman’s property tax rate increase (from 93 cents per $100 of assessed value to 98 cents) and eliminate Pittman’s proposed income tax rate increase (from 2.8% to 3.2% for earnings above $400,000 for individuals and above $480,000 for joint filers).
While Volke wouldn’t suggest any specific budget cuts at the meeting, knowing the tax cut was likely not to pass the majority Democratic council, he said he would have no problem finding millions of dollars to cut from the budget to balance it with the smaller taxpayer funding if the tax cut were to pass.
“I am smart enough to figure out where this is probably going but I do think that this is important for me to at least stand up for people that I represent and say to them, ‘I tried to keep the rate where it was,’” he said.
Volke, Fiedler and Leadbetter said their constituents have been very concerned about the proposed tax increase. Leadbetter said a large chunk of constituents she heard from said they would consider moving out of the county if these tax increases were passed.
“The county executive said people have to dig into their pockets a little deeper and I think that that hurts families at the end of the day,” Fiedler said. “It’s the collective of inflation and taxes passed at the state level and so it’s all of it and residents in my district are feeling the pinch.”
In particular, Volke said he heard from retired residents on fixed incomes who would be especially affected by the property tax increase.
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“If you are concerned about the lower end income earners this property tax increase hits them right in the pocket,” he said.
Council member Lisa Rodvien, an Annapolis Democrat, responded that many low income people don’t live in or own homes, many rent and so are less affected by the property tax raise than higher income residents. Renters are also more affected by inflation, she added, as rents fluctuate but mortgages are locked in for years at a time.
“If you are a property owner, if you are a high income earner, you have benefitted enormously from the folks in this county who are lower income earners and who do not own property and so to ask the property owners and high income earners to bare a larger burden of our taxes is a very reasonable and fair thing to do,” Rodvien said.
In terms of what the county gets for that taxpayer money, Council member Julie Hummer, a Laurel Democrat, said a majority of her constituents said they want better schools and public safety programs. She added that county employees like teachers, police officers and firefighters are hurting from inflation, too.
“I think we would be harming our residents for modest gains in people’s personal pockets,” Hummer said.
Anne Arundel is one of the lowest taxed large counties in the state and it shows in the quality of its services, said Council member Allison Pickard, a Glen Burnie Democrat.
“Nobody wants to pay more in taxes, nobody does. Nobody wants to sit here and raise taxes but find me the cuts,” Pickard said.