Photo by Joanne Beck
After reviewing the last of the city departments — the water fund’s $6.57 million and wastewater's $4.38 million budgets — City Council was done with the process and ready to move on Wednesday evening.
While some council members were good with all of it and asked for no modifications — Kathy Briggs, Al McGinnis, David Twichell, Paul Viele, Rich Richmond, Eugene Jankowski Jr. — others accepted it for now — “We need to take a hard look at this next year,” Councilman Derek Geib said.
“There are some tough decisions that we all have to make. I’m sure everyone did their due diligence,” Richmond said. “We went line by line. Questions were asked and explained in good detail. Budgets were reasonable and sound. I’m good with it.”
Twichell added that he thought City Manager Rachael Tabelski did “an excellent job” at negotiating union contracts, and she, in turn, thanked the council for its support. “We have top-notch employees,” she said.
Two standalones — Council members Tammy Schmidt and Bob Bialkowski — wanted to see no tax increases but didn’t see where else to go by extending budget sessions.
Bialkowski reiterated some of his talking points during these last few weeks of budget meetings, namely that he’d like to see a flat tax levy. He proposed cutting $110,000 out of the Bureau of Maintenance budget’s planned parking lot resurfacing project and said that he expects “our employee to be top notch,” commending the public works and maintenance staff for doing great work.
Tabelski clarified that cutting that money from the BOM budget “just reduces the budget by $110,000” and would not affect the levy since it is coming from reserves.
“You would have to identify something in the budget,” she said.
Bialkowski also questioned the use of video lottery terminal money for police radios, which was mentioned during the police budget discussion. He thought VLT money was not going to be spent in this budget due to the uncertainty of that type of revenue coming from Batavia Downs Gaming.
Tabelski said that council previously approved radio purchases in December using VLT money from 2023; it’s not being used for the 2025 budget, she said.
To recap the budget:
- It’s a proposed $37 million total, with a levy of $6.7 million which calls for a two-cent increase per $1,000 assessed property value, or $2 extra for a home assessed at $100,000.
- It would be a proposed property tax rate of $8.96 per $1,000 assessed value.
- The levy is an increase of $110,000 from the current budget, an exact amount of what Bialkowski proposed cutting from the BOM parking lot project; however, again — Tabelski said it would not make a difference to the levy because the paving project is being paid for with reserves.
- There is also a proposed 19-cent per 1,000 gallons of water increase, or $6.46 per 1,000, along with increases of $2 per quarter for the water meter and $6 per quarter for the capital infrastructure fund.
- All tallied, with an estimated $3.80 more per quarter for the water itself, plus the meter and capital fund increases, that would be about $47 more per year for a family of four, Tabelski said.
- The total yearly increase is dependent, of course, on how much water a household consumes. There are no increases to the sewer fees.
- A proposed stormwater tax that was discussed during budget sessions will not be part of the 2024-25 budget. Tabelski said that council members shared that their constituents were not in favor of it, and that they’d like to discuss it more in the future.
- There are no additional police officers in the budget, per a discussion during the police department portion of council talks. Chief Shawn Heubusch had reviewed a state report that recommended hiring five more patrol officers.
The next City Council meeting will be at 7 p.m. Monday at City Hall. The group is expected to set a public hearing about the budget for Feb. 26, with a final vote to adopt it on March 11.
