WATERVILLE — The Waterville City Council is expected to get its first look Tuesday night at proposed 2020-21 budgets for health and welfare, planning, code enforcement, economic development and the Fire Department.
The budget workshop is set to begin at 7 p.m. and be livestreamed via a link on the city’s website — waterville-me.gov.
The council in July of last year approved a $42.7 million municipal and school budget for 2019-20, resulting in a tax rate of $25.76 per $1,000 in assessed property value.
City school officials have yet to finalize their proposed budget for 2020-21.
On March 31, councilors reviewed proposed budgets for departments, including assessing, finance, city clerk and administration.
City Manager Michael Roy said at the time that in mid-March, the proposed municipal budget, not including schools, would require about $225,000 less in property taxes than last year. Expenses were up, but revenues were also up, he said.
Less than two weeks later, that picture changed dramatically — especially for state revenue sharing — because of the coronavirus pandemic, according to Roy.
He said state revenue comes from two main sources — income tax receipts and sales tax receipts — and both are expected to be hit hard because people have lost their jobs due to the COVID-19 pandemic and are not paying income taxes.
Local consumers are also not spending nearly as much, so there will be a decrease in sales tax revenues, according to Roy.
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