“We will need patience and flexibility to get through the next 12 months,” said Town Finance Director Amy Land.
She was speaking about the fine line that the proposed 2021 municipal budget walks in what she called these uncertain times.
“The budget acknowledges some pretty significant reduction in revenue and it is constrained on the expense side to match that,” Land said.
The budget passed by the Town Council, which will go to voters at the annual Financial Town Meeting on Monday, July 27, is $15,241,210, reflecting a 1.8 percent increase ($275,207) over last year’s appropriation. The Town Council approved a series of measures that allowed last year’s budget to roll over into the current fiscal year, which began on July 1. Health guidelines did not allow the scheduled FTM to be held back in early May.
In an overview of the budget that will be available at the FTM, Land wrote: “Reestablishing a balanced budget required concessions and cuts on many expenditure fronts, including an agreement by [town employee] unions to defer planned wage increases for one year. With those deferrals, expenditure reductions, use of reserve fund balance, slightly aggressive revenue estimates and expanded use of expenditures,
