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Levy creep doesn’t make headlines. It doesn’t get a mayor run out of office. It doesn’t spark protests on the steps of City Hall. That’s the beauty of it. It’s quiet, technical, and packaged with so much spin that by the time homeowners notice, the dollars are already gone.
The City of Minneapolis has perfected the routine — never gouge in one year, just keep ratcheting up until half a billion in property taxes feels normal.
Let’s lay out the scoreboard, because numbers don’t lie even if politicians do.
Ten years ago, the city levy was in the mid-$200 millions. By 2017, city hall green-lighted a 5.5 percent increase, bumping the levy toward the $300 million mark. Two years later, in 2019, another 5.7 percent hike pushed it to about $350 million. Then came 2020 — nearly seven percent more, landing the levy around $374 million.
From there, the slope only got steeper. By 2021 the levy was pushing into the $380 millions. In 2022, close to $390 million. Then in 2023 came the whopper: a 6.5 percent increase that shoved the levy to roughly $414 million. In 2024, the city added another 6.2 percent, bringing the levy to $440 million. By 2025, the certified levy cracked $510 million when you fold in the Park Board and Housing Authority.
For 2026, the mayor’s budget proposal throws another 7.8 percent on the pile — nearly $39 million more.
That’s a decade of numbers that tell the truth better than any City Hall PowerPoint ever will. From roughly $260 million in 2015 to more than half a billion in 2025.
In percentage terms, that’s a doubling in a decade. Inflation over the same span? About thirty percent. Minneapolis’s levy growth outpaced inflation by a country mile.
And don’t think for a second this is just a “big city” problem. This is choice, not destiny. City leaders could have held the line. They chose not to. They chose levy creep.
Now let’s talk impact.
In 2015, a middle-of-the-pack Minneapolis home might have paid around $1,200 for the city’s slice of property taxes. By 2025, that same house is cutting a check for closer to $2,200 — and climbing. That’s a thousand-dollar annual increase in a single decade. Not for a bigger house. Not for a new wing on city hall. Just for the same cops, plows, pensions, and debt payments.
City leaders try to soften the story with a neat little trick called “net after growth.” The pitch goes like this: new construction expands the tax base, so the levy increase doesn’t really fall on existing homeowners. That’s great theater, but it’s still theater. The levy itself always goes up, and once those dollars are in the base, they never leave. The so-called “0 percent” year is a mirage — it just freezes the creep at a higher plateau.
Want another peek behind the curtain? Look at how much of that levy isn’t even negotiable.
Debt service alone — bond redemptions and permanent improvements — is north of $65 million a year. Legacy pension obligations for police and other retirees tack on another $10 to $15 million. That’s before you fund a single squad car or snowplow. In other words, a big chunk of the levy is locked in before anyone even starts talking about libraries, affordable housing, or public safety. The council isn’t really debating whether to raise taxes; they’re debating how much to sugarcoat the inevitability.
And the annual “Truth in Taxation” hearings? Don’t be fooled by the name. They’re scripted performances. Staff roll out dense charts about mill rates and capacity. Councilors nod gravely. A few citizens vent for three minutes each. Then the final levy passes, always lower than the inflated maximum set in September, so the city can claim restraint. But the base grows anyway. The check you write is bigger, even if the headlines say “council cuts levy.” That’s the con.
Over ten years, the average annual levy hike in Minneapolis has run between five and eight percent. Stack those numbers together and you’re not looking at modest, you’re looking at compounding. A five percent increase one year becomes the floor for another six percent the next. That’s why the city’s levy doubled in a decade while inflation only crawled up thirty percent. That’s why homeowners now pay a thousand bucks more each year just to keep the lights on at City Hall.
The defenders will point to rising costs — police contracts, pensions, health care, deferred maintenance, lost federal rescue money. And sure, those are pressures. But pressure doesn’t force a city to double its levy in ten years. Pressure doesn’t require hiding behind jargon and wiggle-room amendments. That’s not pressure. That’s politics.
The truth is simple: Minneapolis has built levy creep into its operating system. It’s not an accident. It’s not bad luck. It’s deliberate, calculated, and carefully managed so taxpayers never get mad enough all at once. A half-billion-dollar levy is now considered normal. Another 7.8 percent increase is treated as inevitable. And the homeowners, landlords, and renters who foot the bill are expected to swallow it year after year with nothing more than a PowerPoint presentation for comfort.
Here’s the real truth in taxation: the truth is that Minneapolis has doubled its levy in a decade. The truth is that inflation didn’t cause it — choices did. The truth is that you’re paying hundreds, even thousands more each year than you would have if city leaders had simply matched inflation. The truth is that levy creep isn’t some abstract budgeting concept. It’s money out of your wallet, permanently.
And until Minneapolis taxpayers stop buying the spin, the creep will keep marching.
Howie Hanson is Northeast Minnesota’s only full-time power blogger. A 50-year newsprint veteran turned online ironman, he’s been pounding out independent, hyper-local takes at HowieHanson.com for more than two decades — usually with one eyebrow raised.
