Residents tell Grafton council Lessard Avenue special assessments will sharply raise taxes

At the City of Grafton council meeting on Nov. 10, resident Carissa Klug told the council that a planned special assessment on Lessard Avenue will increase her family's property-tax/escrow burden from about $4,500 a year to roughly $9,300 once an initial $4,700 special assessment posts in January. "We are looking at very hard years and the street project is not a benefit, but rather a burden," Klug said.

City Attorney Rob Fleming prefaced the public-comment period by warning the council that the Lessard Avenue special-assessment matter is in litigation and advising members not to comment but to listen to speakers. Another resident, Amy Geiger, said earlier predictions that escrows would "probably double" have proved insufficient: "They are tripling. I have never seen anything like this in all my lending years," she said.

The council did not take action at the meeting. Fleming and the meeting record indicate the council limited its role during the public-comment period because of the pending litigation; no council member offered a substantive response or committed to a next step on the record. The transcript does not record a staff estimate of total assessments across the neighborhood, a schedule for any appeals, or an update to the assessment methodology.

Why it matters: Special assessments are billed with property taxes and can materially increase escrow payments for homeowners. Testimony at the meeting raised immediate financial hardship for at least two households and signaled community concern that the cost estimates are larger than previously presented.

The council continued with its consent agenda and other business after the public comments; no vote or directive on the Lessard Avenue special assessments was recorded during the meeting.