Town Manager Peter Joseph, left, and Jessica Maloy, director of finance, have an 2017 operating budget ready for the Freeport Town Council.

“Standard” was the word from Town Manager Peter Joseph and Jessica Maloy, the finance director, as they spoke Monday of the 2017 operating budget that the Town Council began to deliberate this week.

The figures might bear that out, as Joseph and Maloy presented to the council a $9,461,000 operating budget for 2017, which is 1.17 percent more than the Town Council authorized last spring for this fiscal year, which was $9,352,000.

“I think 1.17 percent is fairly palatable,” Joseph said. “I’m OK with it. We have minimal impacts and minimal changes to the budget. There’s a 1.93 percent cost-of-living adjustment for town employees.”

The Town Council will decided it if is OK with the budget beginning on Wednesday, May 11, when councilors begin discussions with department heads. June 7 is the target date for the council to adopt an operating budget along with capital and tax-increment financing budgets, which do not impact the this year’s tax rate.

The proposed operating budget would add 7 cents to the tax rate, which now is $16.80 per $1,000 in assessed property value.

“There are no substantial changes to the budget,” Maloy said. “It’s standard costs.”

Maloy said the Cumberland County tax increase will add 3.7 cents to the tax rate. The county budget is $16,610,407 for 2017, compared to 2016’s budget of $16,548,807.  The proposed Regional School Unit 5 budget would add 94 cents more. All budgets in total would increase Freeport’s tax rate by 14 cents, said Maloy.

“The county and school impacts are much lower than in the past several years,” Joseph said.

Joseph said that the town’s fund balance is right near where it needs to be – by statute, the town must have 1½ months of operating expenses on hand. The 2017 budget package includes $500,000 to offset taxes, compared to $675,000 this year.

The council already has approved a $1.59 million capital budget, a reduction of nearly $259,000. Councilors could tweak that figure during the upcoming budget process.

The TIF budget for 2017 is $1,694,000, which is 3.4 percent less than this year’s $2,549,000. A $750,000 fire-truck purchase is the big difference, Maloy said.

A closer look

The Freeport Town Council timetable for budget deliberations:

Tuesday, May 3: Town manager and finance director present operating, capital and tax-increment financing (TIF) budgets to Town Council

May 11, 5-6 p.m.: Department head informal Q&A session

May 12, 7:30-8:30 a.m.: Department head informal Q&A session

May 17, 6:30 p.m.: Council workshop on operating, capital and TIF budgets

May 31, 6:30 p.m.: Public hearing on operating, capital and TIF budgets

June 7, 6:30 p.m.: Target date to adopt budgets and appropriations