[R]UTLAND — Mayor David Allaire presented his first proposed municipal budget as the city’s top elected official, and it shows a 4.5 percent increase over the current year.
Allaire delivered the spending plan for fiscal year 2019 to the 11 members of the Board of Aldermen at a meeting Monday night. The budget, once the board reviews and possibly reduces it, will go to city voters for approval on Town Meeting Day in March.
The board, according to the city charter, can only make cuts, not additions, to the city spending plan.
“We have taken due diligence to present a responsible budget with as accurate numbers as we can,” the mayor said, adding that the proposed spending increase is about 4.5 percent.
“I believe this provides the level of service that’s needed for the city,” Allaire said. “However, I am fully aware that the Board of Aldermen, as full partners in this process, will have input and other ideas where we may make adjustments and cuts.”
The proposed budget totals $22,023,459, an increase of $946,058 from this year’s spending plan of just over $21 million.
However, the proposed budget does not include roughly $300,000 that voters approved for fiscal year 2018 on special ballot items from social service agencies, such as Regional Ambulance Service and the Marble Valley Regional Transit District, operators of “The Bus.”
If voters were to approve the same roughly $300,000 on special ballot items on the next Town Meeting Day, the total municipal budget increase would be more than 5.5 percent.
Allaire said Tuesday he didn’t include the money for those agencies because voters have not yet approved the outlays and it remains to be seen whether the same number of agencies will request funding.
Also, voters could approve all of the items, reject them all or approve only some.
“As of right now there’s nothing to talk about except for the fact that they could potentially be on the ballot and voters will have the opportunity to vote yes or no on those specific questions,” Allaire said. “I can’t budget items that have not been submitted and have not been voted on.”
Information about revenues and impact on the tax rate was not included in Monday night’s presentation or in information provided along with the budget. Allaire said Tuesday that as the budget process moves forward, he would work to make projections on those figures available if the aldermen would like them.
The board did not discuss the spending plan Monday night. Instead, the panel agreed to send the budget to relevant board committees to review portions of it.
The board has until Dec. 31 to adopt a spending plan.
“I am looking forward to the next few weeks as we collaboratively review the numbers and put a budget before the voters we can defend,” Allaire said.
Allaire said the proposed budget “fully funded” a commitment to the pension fund the Board of Aldermen made last year. He said there are increases across the budget for health insurance, contractual raises and fuel costs.
“During my meetings with department heads I made the decision to make several significant cuts to proposed budgets,” he added.
The reductions included “large-ticket items” like a truck and other equipment in the Department of Public Works, the mayor said. Money to “bump” spending on street work, such as paving, was also nixed, he said. Renovations to the bathrooms at the Godnick Adult Center were also cut.
The city charter had required Allaire to present the budget to the Board of Aldermen by Nov. 1. However, Allaire waited until Monday.
There was no discussion of the delay at the meeting Monday.
Allaire, in a Facebook posting last week, pointed out this was his first budget as mayor and there are also some people in new positions at City Hall.
He made a brief reference to that Monday night, saying, “As you know this has been a year of transition for city government.”
Allaire, a longtime alderman, was elected to his first two-year term as mayor in March.
He pointed out Monday night that the city has a new human resources director and city attorney, and an interim fire chief. Also, former Recreation and Parks Superintendent Cindi Wight recently stepped down to become recreation director in Burlington.
Kim Peters, who had been the recreation director in Killington, was approved as the city recreation superintendent by a unanimous vote of the Board of Aldermen on Monday night.
The “year of transition” for city government is continuing with the upcoming departure of Treasurer Wendy Wilton, who has served in the post for more than a decade. She was recently appointed by President Donald Trump to serve as the federal Farm Service Agency’s state director in Vermont.
At the meeting Monday night, board President Sharon Davis told fellow members that progress is being made on the selection of a new fire chief. A search committee received 34 applications, and a decision could come within a couple of weeks.
