La Plata, MD – It was all in a night’s work for the La Plata Town Council Tuesday, May 26 as they balanced the town budget and did so without raising taxes for the 14th straight year.

“We are not increasing our tax rate for the upcoming fiscal year,” La Plata Mayor Roy Hale said. “For the 14th year in a row, we have not raised the real property tax. I don’t know of any other municipality or county that can say that. It is a major accomplishment and we are only able to do that because of the staff of La Plata that handle our finances in such a way that we are able to maintain our current tax rate.”

“We are waiting now to see what the county will do,” said Councilmember Lynn Gilroy.

Charles County will decide its tax rate June 9.

“It’s noteworthy enough to toot our own horn,” Gilroy added. “We are keeping the water rate and sewer rate low. You will see a reduction in your quarterly bill. We were able to do that and still maintain the level of service we have enjoyed for some time.”

“It reflects on what we’ve been able to accomplish over the last 15 years,” Hale said. “It is not easy to do.”

One issue that came up in the public hearing potion of the meeting that was repeated later in the evening was a proposed increase of 2 percent on hotels in the municipality.

Sonny Patel of Holiday Inn Express in La Plata told the council, “La Plata is a great little town. People love coming here.

“We want the advantage of being able to compete with the rest of the county,” he said. “They do not have to pay the 2 percent. With that 2 percent increase, our customers would have to pay 13 percent in taxes while the rest of the county would only pay 11 percent. That puts us at a disadvantage.

“Let’s sit down and have a conversation and come up with a solution,” Patel implored.

Councilmember Joe Norris suggested that the council table the ordinance until June 9, “which would be our first work session in June for the opportunity to hear any further comments from either the public or hotel owners themselves before we take action,” he said.

“With rest of the budget monetary we were expecting to gain from the hotel tax, what is that going to do to the rest of the document?” Gilroy asked.

“It doesn’t have any effect on our actions,” Town Manager Daniel J. Mears noted.

“I just wanted to make sure we didn’t paint ourselves into a corner,” Gilroy said.

“We have effectively tabled this ordinance until June,” Hale announced.

Police Chief Carl Schinner said that during the month of April the La Plata Police Department covered 839 calls, investigated 46 Part 1 offenses and 44 Part 2 offenses.

“We have investigated 211 criminal incidents this calendar year,” Schinner said, adding officers have a 48 percent closure rate.

Hale asked if the department investigated the recent death of a 3-year-old at Wills Park.

“We have a memorandum of understanding with the Charles County Sheriff’s Office,” Schinner explained. “Any sort of suspicious death, they have detectives with a great deal of expertise and we yield to them in those types of investigations.”

Contact Joseph Norris at joe.norris@thebaynet.com