what is a mill levy 
the mill levy is a property tax it is applied to a property based on its assessed value the rate of the tax is expressed in mills and is equal to one dollar per 1 000 dollars of assessed value the mill levy is calculated by determining how much revenue each tax jurisdiction will need for the upcoming year to fund its budget for public services for example funding public schools and maintaining parks and recreation areas that revenue is then divided by the total value of all property within the area finally the rate from each jurisdiction is added to obtain the mill levy for the entire area 1 