Fitchburg going to voters for $3.6 million referendum (2025)

Fitchburg has become the latest Dane County municipality to announce it will ask taxpayers for more money this November — and blame its budget woes on the state. It’s hosting a series of public information sessions for city officials to make their case.

The City Council on Tuesday voted to place a question on the Nov. 5 ballot asking residents to approve a permanent, $3.593 million increase of the property tax levy, beginning with property tax bills issued in December 2024. If passed, residents would pay an additional $65.18 per $100,000 in assessed property value, or $298.39 a year on the median-value Fitchburg home worth $457,800.

Officials in the city, whose population has increased by about 34% in the past 10 years to more than 32,000, say the increase would fund:

“The City of Fitchburg has identified a need for additional funding to increase staffing and invest in services that will meet the increasing needs of our growing community,” Fitchburg Mayor Julia Arata-Fratta said in a news release.

“People need services, and the city’s ability to address community priorities has been limited by the imposed levy limits that prevent our municipality from adding staffing capacity, among other things. Without additional funding, the city will have to make difficult decisions about how to address the growing need for public safety, parks maintenance and communications services and increasing challenges with staff recruitment and retention.”

Under state law enacted in 2011, growth in the amount of property tax a city can collect is limited to the value of net new construction in the city. The state also has a program to share state revenue with cities, but the formula used for that favors less-affluent cities, and Dane County communities tend to be among the wealthiest in the state.

Fitchburg is allowed a 3.847% increase to its levy, the city said in the news release, which would bring the levy to about $32.6 million. A successful referendum would bump that increase to 11.01% and the levy to about $36.2 million.

City administrator Chad Brecklin said the city has taken a number of steps to find efficiencies in the budget in recent years, including implementing online forms for applying for city permits and licenses, reducing borrowing costs by setting aside money each year to buy city vehicles with cash, adding solar panels and making other environmentally friendly improvements to buildings and operations to reduce utility costs, improving maintenance of roads to extend their life, and looking for state and federal grant opportunities.

“We’re always looking at ways to implement technology and data to find efficiencies,” he said.