The tax rate will climb from $13.38 to $13.91 per thousand dollars of assessed value; an increase of almost four percent.

The village will collect $1,571,638 in property taxes _ an increase of just less than four percent. Property taxes generate approximately 30 percent of all village revenue.

A homeowner with a $150,000 property assessment will see a tax bill that is approximately $81 higher this year.

Village treasurer Mary Ann Henderson said one thing contributing to the increase was employee health insurance which went up ten percent. But the major driving force is a hike in employee pay that averages 15 percent.

Henderson said the village did a survey of other municipalities and found its pay scale to be ``quite low.’’

``It’s a one-time thing to catch everybody up to where they should be,’’ she said.

The pay increase did not extend to elected officials whose salaries remained the same. The mayor is paid $3,200 annually and trustees receive $1,200.

Henderson said the impact of the raises was not as high as it could have been because the streets budget is down more than $100,000 in the tentative budget.

``Finance and personnel worked hard on it to give everyone (employees) and the residents what they needed. I was very impressed this year. There was a lot of give and take,’’ she said.

Mayor Carol Waller said the village needed to get its pay scale in line with others and also adjust for the on-call policy for some employees.

``We needed to get in line. We felt it was better to keep good employees,’’ she said.

Waller said there were other things she would have liked to include, but believed they had to hold the increase as low as possible.

``I asked them to keep it under four percent. I felt we did the best we could,’’ she said.

The general fund, which accounts for 58 percent of all spending, will increase at a rate of approximately four percent, to a total of just less than three million dollars. At the same time, general fund revenues will climb less than one percent for a total of $1,013,557.

The village anticipates it will have a surplus of $440,000 in the general fund at the end of the current fiscal year and $326,000 of that will be applied to the budget for next year.

Total spending throughout all funds is expected to be $5,145,653.

The village will hold its annual organizational meeting and budget hearing on Monday, April 2, at 7:30 p.m. in the village board meeting room.

The budget hearing will begin at 8 p.m. Copies of the tentative budget are available from the village clerk during regular business hours.