Superior Mayor Jim Paine presented his 2026 budget proposal to the City Council on Tuesday. This includes a tax levy decrease.
Superior Mayor Jim Paine will be presenting his draft 2026 budget at the City Council meeting on Tuesday evening. This includes operational, capital, and revolving fund budgets for the upcoming fiscal year as well as projected spending for the following five years.
The budget proposal has a decrease of 1.55% for the city property tax levy while maintaining spending levels for all city services.
“As you know, though, the tax bill that’s going to come out will then add to our tax bill, the school districts’ tax bill, the counties’ tax bill, the Northwood tax bill,” said Paine. “Sorry to say, Councillors, the other three taxing entities are likely to increase their levy, which means the bottom line bill that you and all of your constituents are going to get could very well go up. We cannot control that, but we can control how much we collect. That amount, through years of responsible public policy that you have invested in, our end is going down. We will not be part of that problem for homeowners.”
There is a focus on public safety investments, which include: construction of a new firehall in the North End; expansion of police department staffing; dedicated funding for firefighter mental health; and a traffic light intervention system to increase the speed of first responder response.
There are also infrastructure investments in the budget proposal, including funding for lead line replacements, expanding the ConnectSuperior broadband network, building a new irrigation system to maintain the Nemadji Golf Course, and continued spending on streets, sidewalks, parks, and public safety vehicles. In his budget presentation, Paine mentioned that the spending on street repairs will not increase due to the amount of recent projects.
“This has been a very strange summer for me, for the first time ever I’ve gotten complaints about that there’s too much street construction, which is just not the life of a Mayor,” joked Paine.
Additionally, there will be funds set aside for upcoming initiatives that include a marketing/tourism coordinator, improved archiving and public records access, and an expansion of city bus service.
The press release about this budget included the following statement:
“The 2026 budget demonstrates Superior’s growing fiscal health. We are now among the most financially healthy cities in Wisconsin and easily the strongest performing city in the Twin Ports. This budget makes significant investments in our long-term prosperity and immediately improves safety and quality of life for the people of Superior.”
