Cary proposes property tax increase for public safety. What homeowners could pay
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- Cary officials propose a 3.75-cent per $100 property tax increase to expand public safety.
- The proposed budget of $573.5 million is about a 12% increase over last year’s budget.
- The budget adds 21 new police officer positions and boosts public safety spending by 44%.
Cary’s interim town manager is proposing a tax rate increase of 3.75 cents per $100 of assessed property value to expand public safety measures, implement additional financial oversight and address other town needs.
The budget is the town’s first since former Town Manager Sean Stegall resigned in December amid questions surrounding the town’s spending. Stegall had been town manager since 2016.
He was replaced by now-interim Town Manager Russ Overton, who was previously deputy town manager.
The proposed tax increase would bring the town’s tax rate to 37.75 cents per $100. The owner of a home valued at $649,000, the median value in Cary, according to the town website, would see their town tax bill rise from about $2,206 to about $2,450, an increase of $244.
The budget totals $573.5 million, up around 12% from last year’s budget of $510.9 million.
The budget adds 55 new positions to Cary’s town staff of over 1,300, including 21 new police officer positions.
This is the first time Cary has budgeted for new police officers in 10 years, said Police Chief Terry Sult. The town is budgeting an additional $112.4 million in total toward public safety, a 44% increase over the current budget.
It would also add a new budget director position and two internal auditor positions to address spending concerns.
What could property tax bills look like?
Most of Cary lies in Wake County, with a small portion of the town in Chatham and Durham counties, all of which charge separate county taxes.
Wake County Manager David Ellis is proposing to add another 2 cents to the county’s current tax rate, bringing it up to 53.71 per $100. For a $649,000-valued Cary home, that would add about another $125 to the current Wake County tax bill of about $3,360.
If both tax rate increases are approved, they would result in a total tax bill of nearly $6,000. That’s an increase of nearly $375 over the current combined Wake County and Cary property tax bills.
Public safety investments
Most of the new positions the town is adding are related to public safety.
They include:
- 21 new police officers and a total increase in the police department’s budget of around $10 million.
- Six new 911 operators and a total increase to the emergency communications budget of around $1.1 million.
- Six new firefighters and an increase of about $1.4 million to the fire department’s budget.
The town is also investing $9 million into new fire department vehicles and $2.5 million into designing two new fire stations.
How the town is addressing financial transparency
The budget proposal includes a new budget director position and two internal auditor positions, and the finance department’s budget would go up by approximately $2 million.
“We must ensure that our financial practices, internal controls, and Council decision-making processes meet the highest standards of transparency and responsibility,” Overton said in a Thursday news release. “This budget includes the addition of two positions within our Finance department to enhance internal capacity, improve oversight, and support stronger financial controls. In the coming year, we will also continue refining policies and procedures to help ensure more consistency, transparency, and accountability in how public funds are managed.”
Prior to the budget presentation in a meeting Thursday, Cary town officials discussed the town’s external auditor contract. The council will vote on awarding the contract later this year, officials said.
“We’re under a lot of pressure” to come up with a plan to address the concerns raised by previous questionable spending, Council Member Carissa Kohn-Johnson said.
Council members acknowledged that there were concerns around the town’s current external auditor, accounting firm Cherry Bekaert, after scrutiny of spending practices in the town bubbled to the surface last year.
But the external auditor is working from information that the town gives it, town officials said Thursday. And the auditor is looking at the budget as a whole, not scouting for fraud. That’s an extra service the town would have to pay for with Cherry Bekaert, officials said.
“We’re not experts,” Kohn-Johnson said. That’s where staff positions for internally auditing the town come in, she said.
The budget process was also different this year, town officials said.
First, the council was more involved in the budget, having work sessions and briefs on aspects of the budget before the budget presentation, said Capital Projects Director Stacey Teachey.
Second, departmental directors submitted their own budget requests to the town manager, which was one of the starting points for the budget, according to Teachey.
And third, the town held a budget open house in April to garner resident input on the budget.
The process
There are public hearings on the budget set for May 28 and June 11, both at 6:30 p.m. at the town council’s chambers at 316 N. Academy St.
Cary’s town council is set to vote on the budget proposal June 25.
This story was originally published May 14, 2026 at 5:20 PM with the headline "Cary proposes property tax increase for public safety. What homeowners could pay."
