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Supervisor Yvette Aguiar, pictured last month in a working session, presented the city’s provisional budget for 2022 this week. (Joe Werkmeister)
The town of Riverhead Provisional budget 2022, released Thursday, calls for a reduction of less than one percent in the city-wide tax levy.
The municipal budget consists of the general fund, the road fund and the street lighting district, which are the three municipal funds paid by all land taxpayers in Riverhead.
The tax levy in the provisional budget, which is the amount of money collected through taxes, has gone from the current levy of $ 49,664,100 to $ 49,305,400.
Supervisor Yvette Aguiar said the city has not cut taxes in the past 21 years.
The budget provides for a reduction in the road fund from $ 6.81 million to $ 6.61 million.
The total expenditure in the provisional budget increases by 2.08%, from $ 59 million to $ 60.3 million. The city-wide tax rate per $ 1,000 of assessed value increases 1.27% from $ 58,000 to $ 58,737 per $ 1,000. This equates to $ 81 more in taxes for someone with an average assessment.
Riverhead, unlike other towns, also includes a number of special districts to which only certain taxpayers contribute, such as Sewer Districts, Ambulance District, and Garbage District. Overall city spending increases by $ 458,000, or 0.0046%.
“2021 has turned out to be a year of progress for the town of Riverhead,” Ms. Aguiar said in her budget message. She said the city’s plans were moving forward “despite the current financial challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic.”
She said the city has cut spending and also received a positive audit from the State Comptroller’s Office, which said the city “correctly assessed the impact of the pandemic on financial operations while developing estimates for significant income and expenditure in the budget adopted in 2021 “.
In addition, Ms. Aguiar said, “For the first time in more than two decades, Moody’s Investors Service has raised the rating of the City of Riverhead bonds from Aa3 to Aa2, a significant sign of the fiscal stability of our debt burden. the debt.
The provisional budget must be presented by the supervisor to the municipal council before October 1.
The supervisor said her provisional budget for 2022 “gives our city the opportunity to improve our critical IT infrastructure, provide body cameras to our police officers, continue to expand our code enforcement service, continue updating our comprehensive master plan and continuing the development of our new Town Square along the Peconic River.
The police corps cameras will be funded by the American Rescue Fund and are currently not included in the interim budget, according to the city’s financial administrator Bill Rothaar. He said the cameras cost $ 100,000.
The city council has to hold a public hearing on what is then called the preliminary budget. From there, the entire board must vote to pass the final budget by November 20, under state law. If the city does not vote to adopt a budget, the preliminary budget becomes the final budget.
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