Proposed Beacon budget below state cap
The Beacon City Council on Monday (Oct. 7) began its review of the city’s proposed 2025 budget, a plan that includes $26.2 million in general fund spending along with $5.4 million in the sewer fund and $4.3 million in the water fund.
If adopted, the budget would reduce property tax rates to the lowest point in more than 15 years while staying $255,538 below the state’s tax cap.
However, at $1.7 billion, the city’s housing assessments have more than doubled in the past decade, so individual property owners’ tax bills could rise despite the tax-rate decrease. Commercial assessments, at $415.8 million, have nearly doubled.
Under the proposed budget, a $530,000 home would see its tax bill rise by about $85, or 2.9 percent. A $500,000 commercial property would pay $340, or 7.4 percent less. Water and sewer fees would increase by 3 percent each, which Mayor Lee Kyriacou noted on Monday is lower than the rate of inflation.
In the examples above, the residential tax bill would increase while the commercial would decrease because of what New York State calls “base proportion” percentages. The percentages can change from year to year and determine the balance between residential and commercial properties in making up the city’s tax levy, which would be $13.25 million under the proposal.
In 2025, residential taxes must account for about 73 percent of the levy, and commercial taxes 27 percent. The levy is proposed to increase by $490,043, or 3.8 percent, with new construction mitigating the tax impact by adding $37 million to city rolls. In the past five years, Beacon has seen $178 million in new construction or significant renovations added to its taxable base.
The 2025 budget proposes no new employees or programming and, for the first time in at least a decade, draws nothing from the city’s reserves. “I strive to use no fund balance — that would be what’s referred to as a balanced budget,” Susan Tucker, the city finance director, told the council.
The budget would eliminate the Community Investment Grant program, which received $20,000 for local projects and initiatives in each of the last four years.
Sales tax revenues are projected to increase from $5.8 million to $6.1 million because of a tax-sharing agreement that Kyriacou negotiated with Dutchess County in 2022. The budget also projects receiving $60,000 from a 2 percent tax being considered by the council. (A public hearing on the occupancy tax, which would apply to hotels, motels and short-term rentals, is scheduled for Oct. 21.)
The largest cost increase is the city’s mandatory contribution to the state pension system, which will increase for a second year, this time by $351,000. The proposal includes 5 percent salary increases for the Police Department that were effective last month. It does not reflect a new agreement with the Civil Service Employees Association, the union that represents most city employees. The current agreement expires Dec. 31.
The council will meet over the next three weeks with department heads before holding a public hearing on the proposed budget on Nov. 4. It must be adopted by Dec. 16, the council’s last meeting in 2024.
