This month, the Town Board held two public hearings about the 2027 budget for Shandaken. These hearings made it clear that some residents had questions about the process.
As the chief fiscal officer for the Town of Shandaken, the Supervisor has to monitor daily cash flow to ensure that projected income such as grant reimbursements, ambulance insurance payments, and building fees come in as anticipated. The Supervisor also has to be ready to seek funding for surprise expenditures, like the water main break in Pine Hill last winter. Beyond cash flow, the Supervisor needs to ensure a Town can withstand fiscal stress. This is the reason I’ve been so focused on catching up on delinquent Annual Financial Reports.
To create the annual budget in our Town, the Supervisor starts in late summer to gather information from department heads about spending trends and anticipated needs for the coming year. I also reached out to other Supervisors, as well as County and State officials to sus out broader trends, like the increases in healthcare spending, and the expected decrease in sales tax revenue from Ulster County.
Most towns have dedicated bookkeepers and/or budget officers to do this work. In Shandaken, three assistants enter all bookkeeping data in our accounting program. But, they also handle human resources, billing, grant reporting, facilities management, public inquiries, and more. Because everyone wears multiple hats in Shandaken, Supervisors need to be able to run their own accounting reports to ensure timely oversight. I ran year-to-date reports for every accounting line, projected spending for the remainder of the year, and compared those numbers to the previous year.
During the budgeting process, if there’s an inkling that the budget might exceed the NY State tax levy cap (2% in 2026) a local law is required, as well as a public hearing specific to exceeding the cap. This year, we will exceed the 2%. But, for context, every town in Ulster County has raised tax levies, with increases ranging from 2% to 25%. Shandaken’s preliminary budget has a relatively conservative 3.8% increase in the tax levy.
There are plenty of thoughts about why costs have steeply risen this year. But what can Shandaken do to lower taxes for residents? We a limited tax base. We also have significant environmental and geographic restrictions on development. Yet, we still have roads, emergency services, and infrastructure to maintain across a large rural town.
Each day Shandaken’s board and staff look for ways to control spending and operate more efficiently, but the bottom line is we either grow our tax base or cut vital services.
UP NEXT: after the general election, there’s another public hearing inviting anyone to speak for or against adopting the preliminary budget. The Board can then make changes or move to a resolution to adopt the preliminary 2027 budget.