77-27,139.03 Aid to municipalities; calculation of state aid.
77-27,139.03. Aid to municipalities; calculation of state aid.(1) State aid provided to municipalities pursuant to sections 77-27,139.01 to 77-27,139.04 shall be calculated by determining the average property tax levy for operational purposes other than for principal and interest payments on the indebtedness of all incorporated municipalities. The Auditor of Public Accounts shall provide to the Department of Revenue a list of the bond and nonbond tax request amounts from the most recent budgets filed by incorporated municipalities. The information shall be used to calculate the bond and nonbond tax levies for aid purposes under this section. The auditor shall provide the information to the department by February 1 each year.(2) Each municipality shall receive state aid from the Municipal Equalization Fund equal to (a) the product of the average per capita property tax of the appropriate population group multiplied by the current population of the municipality minus (b) the product of the average property tax levy multiplied by the certified valuation within the incorporated municipality, except that a municipality shall not receive any aid under this section if the calculation results in a negative number.(3) If a municipal tax levy for operational purposes was less than the average property tax levy in the immediately preceding fiscal year, the state aid provided to such municipality shall be reduced by twenty percent for each one-cent increment the levy was below the average property tax levy.(4) If the amount of money in the Municipal Equalization Fund is less than the total amount of state aid for all municipalities as required by the allocation formula in subsection (2) of this section, the money in the fund shall be allocated on a prorated basis to such municipalities. If the amount of money in the fund is more than the total amount of state aid for municipalities as required by the allocation formula, (a) one million six thousand dollars of the excess money in the fund for fiscal year 2002-03 shall be distributed along with and in the same manner as provided in section 77-27,137.01 and the remainder shall be credited to the General Fund and (b) the excess money in the Municipal Equalization Fund that is in excess of three hundred thousand dollars for all other fiscal years shall be credited to the General Fund and the first three hundred thousand dollars shall be distributed in the same manner as provided in section 77-27,137.01 to municipalities that have not adopted a local option sales tax by January 1 of the fiscal year for which the fund is distributed. SourceLaws 1996, LB 1177, § 3; Laws 1997, LB 269, § 55; Laws 1998, LB 989, § 5; Laws 1999, LB 141, § 10; Laws 2000, LB 968, § 72; Laws 2003, LB 622, § 1.