City hires adviser for tax

Portland is one step closer to establishing a stormwater tax.

The city’s board of works met Wednesday and signed off on a $10,000 contract with Baker Tilly to help advise Portland on the amount of the tax and make sure the city is doing what it needs to in order to be eligible for grants after a stormwater rate is set.

The board also finalized the hiring of new employees for Portland’s fire and street departments.

Mayor John Boggs said the stormwater tax will produce a needed revenue stream for Portland and make it eligible for up to $500,000 in grants from the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs.

With more money in hand, Boggs said the city can help pay for projects included in its longterm control plans for the wastewater treatment plant and downtown flooding.

“We have no mechanism at all to address flooding,” Boggs said, adding that it is “logical” to establish a tax to help pay for projects that benefit the community.

In a 2019 study provided as a guide to the city, Baker Tilly reported the average residential stormwater tax was $5.62. As of 2010, the average rate for cities with a population between 5,000 and 10,000 was $5.97 a month, according to the study.

Of the cities and towns included in the study that already have a stormwater tax, there were only a handful of cities with a more pressing flooding problem than Portland, Boggs said.

The tax has been preliminarily approved by city council and is expected to be enacted in January.

The board also signed off on hiring Jason Thobe for the street department and Dustin Guggenbiller for the fire department.

Thobe, who will be filling Guggenbiller’s previous post, is a truck driver for Crown City Logistics and is already certified to drive large trucks, superintendent Tom Leonhard said. He is expected to start work Monday.

Guggenbiller was hired in August by the board but it formally hired him as the department’s 10th full-time firefighter Wednesday after his application was approved by state and local pension boards.

In other business, board members Steve McIntosh, Jerry Leonhard and Boggs:

•Heard four bids to demolish the house owned by Mary Bollinger at 1018 W. Arch St., Portland. Portland’s Crown City Logistics was the lowest bidder at $4,300. Those bids were taken under advisement.

•Agreed to sell a lot at 1150 Massachusetts Ave., Portland, to Paul Keen for $3,000. It was sold at an auction to Keen, who was the only bidder, and was appraised at $7,000, Portland clerk-treasurer Lori Phillips said.