Questions Commissioners Should Address:

    At their Budget Workshops the Commissioners should learn the answers to the following questions and direct the County Manager to provide them to Chowan County residents.  The answers should be in writing, completely transparent and in plain English, easily understood by the average taxpayer.

Please email them (board@chowan.nc.gov) with any of these questions or others that you have.

1.  What is the certified revenue-neutral tax rate for FY 26-27?  The county manager indicated it is .5525 per hundred on a $3.04 Billion total tax base.  Who did this computation and who certified it?  Why is he proposing a tax rate 9% higher than neutral? How much of this year's tax base, which is $1 Billion more than last year is attributed to Timber Mill?  Is that the final valuation for Timber Mill? How many cents of the adopted tax rate this year will be paid by Timber Mill?  How is that projected to change over time?  Press releases say the first payment equalled $750,000; how much of that actually went into revenues for the FY26-27 budget?  What can we anticipate total annual revenue will be in the future?  (*  See Note 1 below for update)

2.  How many cents of the adopted tax rate are attributable to John A Holmes school debt service?  What is the first-full-year figure and what is the expected annual debt repayment amount and schedule.  How many years will be required until the debt is fully paid off?

3.  Was the Davenport financial analysis updated when the John A Holmes project grew from $50 million to $85 million?

4.  Why were no declining neighborhoods shown in the 2026 reappraisal presentation? 

5.  Why were the 2022 assessments of lower cost homes set so far below their sale price?  Does the 2026 reappraisal correct or propagate that regressivity?

6.  Does the county intend to publish a full dataset of 2026 assessed values across all parcels?

7.   In each revaluation (2022 and 2026) the tax rate was set higher than the revenue-neutral rate, even though the county certified to the LGC no increase in taxes would be needed to finance John A Holmes.  Please explain why this happened, and can we anticipate a repeat every four years with each new valuation?

* Note 1  From the County Manager's Budget Message online:

    Other Services

    - Economic Development--The FY 2026-2027 budget appropriates $1,996,547 for an economic development grant.  Timbermill???

    - The Re-valuation Fund--Anticipates a budget for FY 2026-2027 of $100,000 in preparation for the next revaluation scheduled in 2030  (will the     next reval cost $400,000?)

    -Debt Service Fund--   Primarily JAH High School Debt

        --Revenues: The FY2026-2027 budget anticipates revenues to the debt service fund of $2,411,341.  This includes a transfer from the General Fund of $1,654,077,  a transfer from the Capital Reserve Fund of $175,000 and a transfer from the School Capital Reserve Fund of $582,264.

        --Expenditures: The FY2026-2027 budget provides $969,643 in principal and $1,266,698 in interest toward the County's debt obligation, a total of $2,236,341 for debt service.  The FY2026-2027 budget also provides $175,000 for future debt service payment on the purchase of an ambulance.  Total expenditures on the FY2026-2027 budget are $2,411,341.