The Bronxville Board of Trustees will hold a special meeting tonight at 7 p.m. to vote on the 2012-2013 village budget. The meeting will be at Village Hall, 200 Pondfield Road.
Bronxville officials are looking at a $13.98 million budget for the 2012-13 fiscal year that is about 2.8 percent higher than this year’s amount. If passed without any modifications, it will include a 4.6 percent tax levy increase and a 4.58 percent tax rate increase.
The proposed spending plan asks for tax increases above the state’s 2 percent cap, in part because of increases in the municipality’s contribution to the state retirement fund. In Scarsdale, fund balance and any leftover funds from the current budget will be used to keep tax levy increases to the 2 percent level.
“We’re having to budget $260,000 more than this year for pensions,” said Harold Porr III, Bronxville’s village manager. “Last year, we paid $940,000. This year, it’s $1.2 million.”
In order to keep below the state’s 2 percent tax levy cap, the village will have to eliminate about $202,500 in expenses from the tentative budget.
The tentative budget includes no raises except for positions that come with step increases: police patrol officers and library caretaker. It restores a full-time position in the village parking office to handle tickets, and keeps Department of Public Works staff at 18. It eliminates a full-time library staff assistant and a full-time library position. Employee benefit payments will increase by nearly 8.5 percent, most of it to the state’s retirement system, although there are increases for worker’s compensation and insurance.
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Blah, blah, blah. The net result is a 5% increase during a time of near depression. Investment bankers and Wall Street fakers. Lawrence Park was begun as an arists’ colony. Anyone seen a true “artist” in Bronxville in the last two decades?