Whoops. The folks in Harrisburg are calling it an honest mistake but taxpayers aren’t buying it.
They approved a property-tax increase that was higher than allowed by a 2006 law aimed at cutting homeowners’ property taxes.
The state Education Department has ordered the district to return about $60,000 in excess taxes which were paid under a new law. There’s just one problem: the law requires school districts to keep tax increases within an inflationary index unless they receive permission to exceed it. Harrisburg didn’t get permission. By law, Harrisburg was supposed to limit the rate increase to 5.1% and instead raised taxes by 5.28%.
Harrisburg superintendent Gerald Kohn said:
I am embarrassed that we made this mistake, and we will assure that this mistake will not occur again.
Kohn is not the only superintendent grappling with new math: Bermudian Springs, Penn-Delco, Northern Cambria and Elizabethtown Area all made mathematical errors in their indexes. However, Education Secretary Gerald Zahorchak made it plain that of the five districts, only Harrisburg’s over-taxing was deliberate.
