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Council approves multiyear levy ballot measure; specifies West Region CPI for annual adjustments
Summary
The council voted to submit a multiyear levy measure to the ballot that would authorize an initial levy of $1.50 per $1,000 assessed value and allow annual increases tied to the CPI-U West Region; council amended the draft to explicitly reference the West Region CPI before passing it.
On July 8 the Benton City Council approved Resolution 2026-47 to submit a multiyear levy question to the county for placement on the November ballot, authorizing an initial levy rate of $1.50 per $1,000 of assessed value and providing that future annual adjustments be tied to the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U), West Region.
Staff (Staff member) explained the drafting choices and noted the city must specify which CPI series will be used; the proposed language in the resolution ties adjustments to the 12-month August-to-August CPI-U for the West Region of the United States. Committee member (Speaker 3) moved an amendment to explicitly add "CPI-U, West Region" to the ballot title and resolution to avoid ambiguity. After amending the resolution to specify the West Region index, the council approved the amended resolution to place the levy question on the ballot.
The resolution also states the limited purposes for which the multiyear levy funds would be used (the draft lists "community safety funding to law enforcement and code enforcement"), and staff noted statutory language that affects how such levies are computed. The council directed staff to finalize ballot-language details and to file the required materials with the county elections office by the local filing deadline.
