Town tightens budget belt

The town of Saratoga’s sales tax is down 16 percent from last year meaning revenue this fiscal year may also be down.

The sales tax accounts for about 80 percent of the town’s revenue, said Town Treasurer Joe Elder. The decrease in sales tax has shown in the town’s budget.

The Saratoga Town Council passed an ordinance May 21 to “provide the necessary income to finance the 2013/2014 fiscal year budget on first reading.”

Last year, the town had $2.7 million in revenue for its budget. This year, the town may have $2.4 million to allocate to different departments.

Elder said the sales tax revenue is a moving figure.

“They are projecting the budget based on what they think will come in,” Elder said.

Elder and the Mayor John Zeiger both think people will begin to buy more in the summer, increasing the town’s sales tax revenue.

However, the town is asking various departments to tighten their belts, Zeiger said.

“Each department was asked to cut as much as they could,” Zeiger said. “We aren’t going barebones, but each department had to cut.”

The town is not considering cutting positions at this time, Zeiger said.

“There is no indication or willingness on the council’s part to even consider cutting employees,” Zeiger said.

However, the town may consider eliminating positions through attrition if personnel decide to quit, Zeiger said. But it depends on what position it is.

“If someone from the street department decided to quit, we would probably replace that person,” Zeiger said.

After several buget workshops, the budget is now in line with revenue, but those numbers could still change.

“Just because it is written down on a piece of paper doesn’t mean a department is going to get what they want,” Zeiger said.

If the town needs to cut the budget further, Zeiger said most of that might come out of the street department. Some projects Public Works Director Chuck Bartlett wanted to get done were not even put into the budget because of squeezing revenue.

“There were some projects Chuck wanted to get done, but the money wasn’t there, so we didn’t even budget for it,” Zeiger said.