Hearing on 2024-25 budget set for April 10
At its Wednesday (March 20) meeting, the Cold Spring Village Board continued discussing the 2024-25 budget, which includes anticipated general fund spending of $3 million and may require a property-tax increase of just under 3 percent.
Most services, including police, fire and road maintenance, are paid for from the general fund. The 2023-24 budget, in which projected spending was about 10 percent higher, at $3.3 million, included a tax increase of 2 percent.
The revenue anticipated for fiscal 2024-25, which begins June 1, includes $1.9 million in property taxes and $302,000 from weekend parking meters and residential permits that go into effect April 1. The budget also anticipates $31,000 from a hotel room tax that includes short-term rentals and $41,000 from permits such as dock fees charged to Seastreak.
The levy raised through property taxes is projected to increase by 3.93 percent, providing $72,500 in additional revenue. The property tax rate would increase by 2.99 percent per $1,000 in assessed value.
The board has scheduled a public hearing for April 10 and is expected to adopt the budget on April 24.
In other business….
■ Village crews have installed lighting on the Cold Spring dock to replace fixtures destroyed by vandals.
■ The annual Cold Spring in Bloom will be held on Main Street on April 21, hosted by the Chamber of Commerce.
■ The annual Kids Fishing Day hosted by the Nelsonville Fish and Fur Club will be held at the village reservoir on Fishkill Road on May 5.
■ The Cold Spring Film Society will feature four movies this summer at Dockside Park on the Saturday evenings of June 29, July 13, July 27 and Aug. 10. Rain dates are the following day.
■ The Sloop Clearwater will hold an education camp at Dockside Park on Aug. 2 and 16.
■ The Village Board accepted the results of the audit of village financial practices by EFPR Group for the fiscal year 2022-23; the audit found no significant issues.
A case in point, Cold Spring continues to be impecunious — even hapless: forced to make less than optimal choices simply to survive, such as the pittance of docking revenue the hideous Seastreak throws off. Instead of raising taxes, and in the event HHFT annexes Dockside for a trailhead compound to the former dumpsite, HHFT should be required to contribute no less than $450,000 per year to ensure that the tourist-blight-degraded infrastructure we stand to experience from their traffic and tourist blight will be funded from their bottomless coffers, not our strapped budget, including but not limited to full-time police officer and three tourist stewards presence in the lower village from Memorial Day thru Thanksgiving Day.