The Deerpark town board on Nov. 7 unanimously adopted a $7.7 million budget for 2025, which is up by about $1 million from the current year’s budget.
The budget covers the town’s main operating fund, highway department, three fire districts of Huguenot, Cuddebackville, and Sparrowbush, and its only lighting district.
The majority of the budget bump is supported by projected increases in revenues—such as sales and mortgage taxes—and a larger share of the fund balance.
The property tax levy has a modest increase of less than 2 percent across six funds.
However, for an average homeowner in town, the combined mill rate, which calculates the amount of taxes levied per $1,000 in assessed property value, is lower than that of the current year, according to a rate schedule report attached to the proposed budget.
The drop in rates is largely a result of a growing tax roll with new homes and property improvements, according to town supervisor Gary Spears.
“With the increased assessments in the town, most residents, depending on which fire districts they are in, won’t see any tax increases, so that is good,” Spears told The Epoch Times.
According to the aforementioned rate schedule report, a homeowner with a property valued at $100,000 in both the Cuddebackville Fire District and Lighting District No. 1 will see a reduction of $38 in the sum of town, fire, and lighting taxes next year.
A similar homeowner in the Sparrowbush Fire District will see a close to $26 reduction, and one in the Huguenot Fire District will see a reduction of $33, according to the report.
According to Spears, the town did not reassess existing properties on the tax roll this year, except for those with value-altering improvements or downgrades.
As for the fund balance, which mostly contains unspent revenues from past years, $1.2 million is used to balance the budget, almost doubling that of this year’s plan.
In the past, due to conservative revenue budgeting, realistic expense forecasts, and the utilization of grant money, the town hardly dipped into the fund balance to the degree as budgeted, and untouched portions subsequently rolled over to the following year’s budget, according to discussions at the Nov. 7 town board meeting.
There is about $2.3 million in the town’s fund balance, according to discussions at the same meeting.
As for salaries for elected town officials, the town supervisor will get $57,080 next year, up from $55,000 in the current year; the highway superintendent will get $74,080, up from $72,000; and the town clerk will get $57,080, up from $55,000.
Each of the two town justices sees a salary increase of $500 and earns $27,000.
Town board members’ salaries remain flat at $12,000 each.
“I think it is an outstanding budget,” Councilman Arthur Trovei told The Epoch Times. “We try to be very conservative on what we are taking in and what we are spending.”
Councilwoman Christa Hoovler told The Epoch Times about the adopted budget, “We are not going to strap a huge tax from the town on our residents, and we are being thoughtful and intentional about how the money is spent.”
