MONTPELIER — City Manager Bill Fraser provided city councilors with a $17.8 million budget proposal that reflects what he repeatedly described as a “hard reset” — one that Mayor Jack McCullough worried might be just plain hard.
“This isn’t feeling like an easy budget year,” McCullough observed after listening to Fraser’s meeting-ending budget overview Wednesday night. “We could be … working on it (the budget) right until the end.”
A year after adopting a budget that boosted city spending by roughly $1.2 million, an increase of 7.6%, councilors were presented with a plan that contemplates a much smaller increase.
The proposal on the table reflects a year-over-year spending increase of nearly $450,000, or just under 2.6%.
“It’s a pretty modest spending proposal,” Fraser said, noting that if the first version of the budget were adopted by the council and approved by voters it would require raising nearly $11.8 million in property taxes — an increase of almost $370,000, or 3.2%. That’s roughly equivalent to the current rate of inflation, which is the starting point for a council conversation involving an administrative proposal that didn’t have Fraser brimming with enthusiasm.
“There’s a lot of bad ideas in this budget,” he said at one point.
However, Fraser acknowledged some belt-tightening was likely necessary in post-pandemic, post-flood, post-reappraisal Montpelier, where paying property taxes has become increasingly challenging for some.
Based on assumptions contained in the administrative proposal the tax rate would increase roughly 2.75 cents, adding $102 to the tax bill for the average home in Montpelier, which, in the wake of the reappraisal, is assessed at $370,000.
The budget assumes no change in the Grand List, which may be overly optimistic given a combination of flood-damaged properties and the results of soon-to-be-concluded reappraisal-related appeals. It also assumes a 1.5% growth in non-tax revenue and a reduction of more than $140,000 in revenue generated by a 1% tax on rooms, meals and alcohol. The latter adjustment assumes post-flood trends extend into the fiscal year that starts next July.
Fraser said the city’s capital plan, which has been underfunded in recent years to take pressure off the operating budget, is fully funded at its $2.4 million target and, barring a council-approved adjustment would be available for pay-as-you-go projects, planned equipment purchases and debt service.
“The good news is the capital plan is fully funded, and it’s within inflation,” Fraser said. “The bad news is: Everything else.”
The budget eliminates four full-time positions, most of them currently vacant, or soon to be vacant.
The list includes a vacant public works position; a vacant position at the police department; and reflects a plan not to replace a departing firefighter. It also assumes unspecified savings in overtime at the fire department, eliminates a position a recreation department, along with a child care program.
Some of the cuts identified in Fraser’s high-level overview were very specific. Eliminating the Americorps and Youth Conservation Corps programs in the parks department will save $65,000. Others haven’t yet been made. The budget assumes $65,000 in yet to be identified staff savings at City Hall.
Two relatively new positions — a communications coordinator and a sustainability coordinator — remain in the budget, but other initiatives that were launched in recent years have been cut back or eliminated, he said.
The budget eliminates $40,000 for Green Mountain Transit’s My Ride program; cuts $20,000 that underwrites the police department’s K-9 program that was revived last year; $15,000 for a lobbyist; and another $20,000 in stipends for those who serve on committees.
The latter was recommended by a consultant hired by the city’s social and economic justice advisory committee and offered for the first time last year.
Proposed cuts include $100,000 for economic development, which was earmarked to be used this year for the Country Club Road project, as well as an additional $40,000 line item for Country Club Road.
The list of cuts and reductions was long and while councilors didn’t discuss any of them in much detail, they plan to meet next Wednesday to begin their deliberations.
Councilor Lauren Hierl said some of the proposed cuts gave her “heartburn.” McCullough worried they could effect services residents rely on and expect.
The city wildly overspent its budget last year depleting, but not exhausting, a fund balance that isn’t part of Fraser’s budget math.
Next week’s meeting will focus almost exclusively on the budget, and begin with a presentation of the results of an online survey about city spending that just closed.
david.delcore
@timesargus.com
