Budget Article No. 2
IN THE CITY
by Jim Bennett
Last week I shared with you an overview of the challenges the Presque Isle City Council was facing as they spent the last three months trying to adopt a budget for 2012.
As you may recall, a significant part of the challenges was the reduction of non-property tax revenues, especially the revenue that the state of Maine has been sharing with municipal governments since the mid-1970s called Municipal Revenue Sharing. As a reminder, in 2012, the city is projected to receive $468,472 less than was actually received in 2009.
This week I will share with you the end of the story; the final total budget that was adopted by the City Council. After the summary of the budget this week, I will use the next couple of weeks to share details of individual departments and budgets with you.
The adopted budget will not require an increase in the municipal tax rate. As you may remember from last week’s article, your property tax bill consists of three major expenditure components; namely the SAD 1 payment, the Aroostook County payment and the funds needed to run your municipal services. If Aroostook County Commissioners and the SAD 1 Board of Directors pass budgets that do not increase the need for additional property taxes, your property tax rate will remain the same for the third year in a row, or $23.50 per thousand.
The total municipal expenditure levels had to decrease because of the decreasing non-property tax revenues. In fact, the authorized expenditure level is less than it was two years ago, in 2010. Next year, the budget is $173,942 less than it was in 2011 or a 1.62 percent reduction.
In order to achieve the reduction, the City had to reduce the number of authorized employees. It should be noted that all of the positions that were eliminated were either vacant or the current person holding the job had another position within the city offered to them. In other words, the budget does not require the layoff of any employees. It is also our belief that the changes in staffing will have minimal impact on the level of services citizens receive. None of the changes have totally eliminated any program or services.
As I conclude, I would like to extend warm wishes for a safe and prosperous new year from your municipal family.
Jim Bennett is Presque Isle’ city manager. He can be reached at 760-2785 or via e-mail at jbennett@presqueisleme.us.
