Clarkston, The City Is NOT Promising A 5.5-Mill General Operating Millage Reduction If You Vote “Yes” On The Public Safety Millage

People are too smart, though. I mean, come on. We’re talking about there’s an additional 7 mills is what they would be giving us, access to additional 7 mills, with no guarantee that we wouldn’t levy all 7 mills. That’s the problem, ultimately.

~ Al Avery, current Clarkston city council member (running unopposed for mayor), October 12, 2026, city council meeting

Even the suggestion that the city is in any way committing to a 5.5-mill general operating millage reduction is not worth the expense of the powder to blow it to Hades, and I think I might keep this as an open post and update it as more of the bullshit flows out of city hall.

Let’s go back to August 10, 2026, when the city council voted to put a 7-mill tax increase on the ballot in the form of a “public safety” millage that uses a state law loophole to get around the maximum millage we can be charged under the charter. The maximum millage is 15 mills, and that number is adjusted downward every year to account for inflation. The city gets the value of 15 mills as it existed in 1992 (11.4107 mills now). Just as a dollar in your pocket is worth less today than it was in 1992, the 15 mills is worth less today than it was in 1992. Look at it this way – you’re paying a devalued 15 mills in taxes with devalued dollars.

That’s the effect of the Headlee amendment. If the city didn’t like it, it could have straightforwardly asked for a “Headlee override” to increase our 15 mills to 2026 dollars. Instead, it decided to underhandedly go around the 15-mill charter cap through a loophole to get you to authorize a maximum property tax that you send to city hall for Clarkston’s use to a whopping 18.4107 mills by pulling on your heartstrings and trying to get you to believe that it’s all in the name of “public safety.” They’ll take all of it, in dribs and drabs, until they get to that 18.4107 mills, which is a 61% increase in Clarkston property tax.

In city manager Jonathan Smith’s most recent public information meeting on the proposal, he claimed they’re doing it this way because it’s more “transparent.”

Un-effing-believable.

I’ll bet if you asked anyone who wants to vote “yes” on this proposal, they’ll tell you it’s because the city will reduce general millage by 5.5 mills so the net effect of a “yes” vote is “only” a 1.5-mill tax increase. And that’s the brainwashing effect the city wants. It’s also what Smith wants them to think because every time he talks without a lawyer at his elbow, he goes a little bit further with his misrepresentations, all the while claiming he wants to make sure that you get the “facts” and the “truth.” Oh, and you shouldn’t trust those evil social media and internet people.

When I want facts and truth, Smith is the last place I would go for them. Just sayin’.

Here are the facts and the truth.

When the council voted to put this on the ballot on August 10, 2026, the representation it made was it planned a 6-mill reduction in general operating millage if the “public safety” millage passed that would result in a net tax increase of 1 mill. The city didn’t say why it even needed 1 mill for the 2027-2028 budget year; it just wanted it.

Here are their own words from that meeting, and you can verify it by listening to the recording of that August 10, 2026, city council meeting available on the Independence Television website:

City attorney Gerry Fisher: Well, where the other adjustment has to be made is by council during the budget proceeding. And we can’t set a number because you have to have a public hearing for the budget and you can’t make a decision before the public hearing.

Councilmember Laura Rodgers: So, this is just like a, if things go a certain way, we could be a dollar more net. But it could be three dollars more net depending on what the public. [Note: Rodgers can’t keep a mill versus a dollar straight in her head for some reason.]

Fisher: I think it’s what we expect.

* * * * *

Rodgers: This is the worst-case scenario is that you’re, we would keep, after the public hearing, we would keep the 11.4 in our operating and we would increase 7. Is that like worst case scenario?

Fisher: That’s, yeah, 18 mills or whatever it is, yeah.

* * * * *

Councilmember Al Avery: Well, in this particular proposal, there’s no 1 mill discussed. This is 7 mills or nothing, right? In our –

Fisher: Resolution –

Avery: Resolution, it was proposed that we would cap, we would deduct out the 7, but we deduct out 6 and not the full 7. So, it would be an increase of 1 mill, but that’s not on the ballot. And there’s nothing, I mean, to be honest, there’s nothing to say that we get to next May and June and, oh, 1 isn’t gonna be enough, we need 2. Right?

Mayor Sue Wylie: Right.

* * * * *

Public commenter #1: So, it seems, and this is based on what Attorney Fisher said two weeks ago, it seems like there’s a whole lot of upside as far as council is concerned.  If, in fact, the proposal is approved in November, then we’ve really got up to 18, so we could really, with the council’s approval, they can decide that we just don’t need to do 1, that we could do 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, be it up to 18, isn’t it the new number become?

Wylie: You’re talking about mills, right?

Public commenter #1: 18.5, yeah, 18.5 mills.

Fisher: So, if the public approves the 7, if the public approves the 7, and we already have 11.4, so then it becomes the total authorization, not the amount that we’ve decided to levy, but the total authorization is 18.4.

Public commenter #1: Right, and council could decide to do up to 11.4, because, up to 18.4, because that’s been previously approved and consistent with the charter.

Wylie: But why would we do that?

Avery: Yes, but we’d be raising our own taxes.

Rodgers: We live in the same city as you do, where would that be an upside for our council? It might be an upside to have the ability to get funds to pay for police and fire, but –

Public commenter #1: There’s latitude that council has.

Rodgers: You are right about that, yes.

* * * * *

Fisher: Well, I think that what you have to factor in is number one, the representation being made in the resolution, that the amount will be lowered. The 11.4 will be lowered. It’s stated that clearly in the resolution. It will be lowered. The question is, to what extent will it be lowered? And you cannot make that judgment now, because you can’t say what is gonna happen until you have a public hearing. It’s like saying the defendant should come forward, and we’re gonna hang the defendant, and then we’ll have a trial.

* * * * *

Public commenter #2: [O]h yeah, I think you’re likely to blow through all of this well before 2031.

Avery: Yes.

Got that? Your general operation millage offset could be 0 all the way to 7 mills. No promises.

B-b-b-but if council says something in a resolution, you can absolutely rely on that, right?

Wrong. You cannot rely on anything Clarkston city council says in a resolution. Any resolution can be changed from one council meeting to the next by majority vote.

I have two examples to show you about the way the council treats promises made in a resolution. One was an actual, honest-to-goodness promise. The other was the aspirational desire council expressed in connection with the general operating millage rollback if you vote “yes” on the “public safety” millage.

Example #1 – the library millage rollback

You’ve heard me talk about the library millage rollback a lot. The reason for that is that city council showed us who they were, and as Maya Angelou said in her famous quote, when someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time. And it still angers me every time I think about it because I did believe them. I was a fool. And don’t think it’s because of a council change in membership. There are people on council now who remember why this happened and didn’t give a flying eff about the promise. One of those people is mayor Sue Wylie.

I’m attaching a copy of the library millage resolution here. That resolution said that if voters approved a library millage establishing the Clarkston Independence District Library, “in future years, the City will reduce its general operating millage levy by 0.691 mills from the level that the City would otherwise have imposed.” (My underline.)

That was a crystal clear, forever promise. It was not ambiguous in any way. They said if we voted yes, they would give us a tax credit in an amount equal to what we had been paying for library services out of the general fund so we wouldn’t be double taxed for library services in all the years to come. We voted yes.

But the city council weasels credited us only until 2025, when they voted to break their promise and take our money back. Why? Because they wanted to use it to partially offset the costs for giant raises and benefit increases for three of the six city employees, a proposal Smith pushed. In other words, they took food off your table and gave it mostly to three favored employees – the city manager, clerk, and treasurer.

Here were the comments from the May 27, 2025, city council meeting:

Smith: [O]ver ten years ago, there was an agreement by city council to take the sting out of a new library millage of 1.25, to take that sting away. They said, we will reduce the city’s mills by 0.691. And so that was put in place. It did say in future years this would continue, but there’s nothing that says that has to be, by law, that has to be. That couldn’t be removed. So, that’s what’s being proposed here.

* * * *

Councilmember Gary Casey: (responding to a resident’s comment that the city was reneging on its promise regarding the library millage) – [I]t’s a poor choice of terms, reneging. It was a gift to begin with.

Got that? They think that the money you keep is a gift from the city to you. Pretty outrageous, eh? Remember that before you vote to give them the ability to raise your taxes.

Example #2 – the 1-mill net increase if you vote “yes” on the “public safety” millage

No, that’s not a typo. The original resolution said if you voted yes, the anticipated aspirational offset to the 11.4107 general operating millage would be 6 mills, resulting in a net 1-mill property tax increase to you.

That’s right – it’s another if you vote “yes,” we’ll reduce your taxes.

Can you believe they are trying to do this to us again?

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me!

The resolution the council voted on to put this 7-mill steaming pile of excrement on the ballot is linked here and stated, in part:

However, during the process of adopting a budget in 2027, if the newly proposed millage for police, fire, and emergency response is approved, the City Council will reduce the number of mills actually levied for taxation under the operational millage, with the precise amount of the reduction to be determined following the public hearing held on the budget. So, while the current amount of millage which could be levied as an actual tax based on the authorization of 11.4107 mills, if the electors of the City approve a separate millage to fund police, fire, and emergency response services, the City will not need to burden City taxpayers with a levy if the full operational millage. Rather, subject to the public hearing held in 2027 as part of the budget approval process, the City would reduce the amount of the levy under the operational millage so that the expected net taxation on City property would be as follows . . .

What followed was a chart saying they were planning to reduce general operating millage by 6 mills, resulting in a 1-mill net increase in taxes.

That aspirational 1-mill nonbinding suggestion only lasted until Smith’s public information campaign to get you to vote “yes” started. Then the city’s claim was that it planned to reduce the general operating millage by only 5.5 mills for a 1.5 mill net increase.

See? They don’t take resolutions seriously. And you shouldn’t either.

You cannot rely on the city’s claim that it will reduce your 11.4107 general millage by any amount because one resolution can be changed by another.

In short, any promise made in a resolution is worthless. And, even if they actually did reduce the general operating millage by 5.5 mills for the 2027-2028 budget year, did you ask what they plan to do the next budget year? Or the next? No, you didn’t. But Avery told public commenter #2 at the August 10, 2026 city council meeting – they will likely “blow through” the entire 7-mill increase by 2031. So, if you vote “yes,” you’re voting to increase your property taxes by a total of 61% no later than 2031.

As a result of my husband’s ongoing campaign finance act lawsuits against the city (due to their actions relating to the 2024 historic district commission charter proposal), there is a court order in place that restricts what the city can do when it comes to urging you to vote for a ballot proposal. Normally, the only thing they can’t say is “vote yes” or “vote no.” Clarkston is further restricted to only factual representations.

Let’s talk about that for a second. If I say, “Ralph gave me $10 today and then he punched me in the face,” there are two things in that statement that are true. If I only tell you, “Ralph gave me $10 today,” I’ve made a true statement. But I left out something important. No one wants to be punched in the face and maybe you might decide you want to avoid Ralph. That’s an important fact to know!

What Clarkston has been doing is providing half-truths and/or leaving out important facts, and I think Smith is committing campaign finance violations on behalf of the city. I believe that so strongly that I sent a letter to the city attorney last night asking the city to correct the record. I hope it does, but if it doesn’t, well then, I guess we can have three campaign finance act violation lawsuits instead of the two that we have now.

Let me show you what Smith has been doing. And it definitely hasn’t been giving you all the “facts” and “truth.”

During the first public meeting to provide the public with “facts” and “truth” about the 7-mill “public safety” millage on September 24, Smith tried to wiggle past the guardrails and the city attorney corrected him each time. That meeting wasn’t recorded or broadly disseminated, so the people in that room actually received the “facts” and “truth,” but only because of the city attorney. (Remember, the only reason the attorney was there was to keep Smith within the campaign finance act guardrails.)

Smith: So that is, I think, the story I want you to leave with. It’s not 7-mill increase and nothing, no relief elsewhere, that is incorrect.

Fisher: But that’s what’s on the ballot.

Smith: That’s what’s on the ballot. That’s what we can say. In fact, definitively we can say, and that’s what’s on the ballot, is a 7-mill increase. This second step of this reduction, and there’s a footnote at the bottom of this, that reduction is determined in the May 2027 budget public hearing. We won’t know what that actual reduction is, might be more than 5.5, it might be less, I don’t know. But Greg [Coté, city treasurer] and I have looked at the numbers, and we think it’ll be right around 5.5 mills reduction. But I can’t say that definitively, and the ballot proposal that you’re gonna be voting on doesn’t say anything about a reduction. It just says, here’s the new 7 mills that we’re proposing. But there will be some degree of an offsetting reduction. How much, I can’t say, guarantee at this five minutes, but that’s an important part of the story, a very important part of the story. We’re not just taking the current 11 mills and adding 7 on top of that to get to 18. Some people in social media might say that, but that is an incorrect statement. I want you to have the truth here. There will be an offsetting reduction in May of 2027.

Fisher: Or you expect there will be.

Smith: I expect there to be. Yeah.

And that’s the whole truth. The only thing the city can definitively say is you are voting yourself a 7-mill, 61% property tax increase if you vote “yes” on the “public safety” millage. Everything else is an expectation, not a promise.

And it’s a good thing attorney Fisher was there to put Smith’s PowerPoint presentation in context. Smith goes off on his 5.5 mill fantasy for four slides (slides 14-17) and slide 15 shows the fantasy 5.5 mill reduction carrying forward through the 2028-2029 budget year. Pay attention to the small print disclaimers! The representations mean nothing when the disclaimers are considered.

There was no attorney at Smith’s elbow when he created and posted his online video with a title that claimed it was recorded during a nonexistent public information session on October 5, 2026. It had music, a flying city logo, Smith standing in front of a white screen, and no interruptions from the lawyer. I learned by listening to the October 12, 2026, city council meeting that it’s possible Smith did not run this video by the attorney before uploading it.

In that recording, he states:

So, you might be asking, if this millage passes, what will be the new total millage and how does this compare to previous years? Well, based on the facts we know today, the new public safety millage is going to be a 7-mill police, fire, emergency services millage. But what’s important that you understand is that it is our plan to do an offsetting reduction of the operating millage. And at this time, we’re estimating a 5.5-mill reduction of the operating millage. So that would mean 7 mills of new, less 5.5 reduction of the current that would result in a net net increase of 1.5 mills. . . . What we’re proposing going forward starting next year would be a new 7-mill police fire emergency services millage and a reduction of the operating mills by about 5.5 mills. . . . I must reemphasize the 5.5 mill reduction in operating millage is an estimate at this point in time. . . . That reduction will not be finalized until we get to the budget public hearing for next year’s budget, which is typically in May. So next May, we’ll vote on the reduction piece of it.

And he used the same slide deck that included slides 14-17 with tiny footnotes.

So, even though the lawyer forced Smith to say the truth at the September 24 meeting – that the only thing you’re voting on for certain is a 7-mill tax increase and the city may anticipate but isn’t promising any particular general operating millage offset – Smith omitted those truths when he created the video 11 days later. He posted it on the city’s website on October 9, 2026, which was reposted just two hours later to a non-government page with over 15 thousand subscribers. It’s also available on the Independence Television website, and I bet if I sent a FOIA, I’d learn that Independence Television posted it there at Smith’s request.

Smith’s October 12 city manager report went even further with his misrepresentations and said: “If the millage is approved, it is anticipated that an offsetting 5.5 mill reduction of the operating millage will be subsequently approved as part of the annual budget public hearing and approval in May of each year.” (Underscore added.) Slide 15 of the presentation suggests the 5.5 mills offset will go on until at least 2029, and Smith’s October 12 city manager report suggests it could go beyond that.

But Smith can’t promise that.

On October 15, 2026, Smith used his government email and distribution list to blast out a link to his video and slide presentation on the city’s website.

As you can see in the Ralph example, half-truths can rise to the level of lies. And if someone lies, lies often enough, and then gaslights you into believing he’s the true keeper of “facts” and “truth,” perhaps you might believe it.

But the facts are this:

1. 1. The only thing you are voting on is a 7-mill (61%) property tax increase for “public safety” (but the real reason is to free up more money in the general fund because police, fire, and emergency medical services will be paid out of the 7 mills you’re agreeing to rather than the general fund).
   2. There is an aspiration, a wish, a hope, an intention, or a suggestion the city might, maybe, perhaps, thinks it could possibly reduce your 11.4107 general operating millage tax by 6 mills. No wait, 5.5 mills. Well, haha, joke’s on you, it could be 0 mills.

Don’t let Smith fool you. Those are the facts and truth. And I hope the city issues a correction, so we don’t have to hash this out in court.

Please vote “no” on the 7-mill “public safety” millage!