Where the Money Comes From – And Where It Goes

By Kathy Savolt -

At the February 27th Board of Trustees meeting, the Board adopted the Budget Calendar. The Village is on a June 1 – May 30 fiscal year and the budget must be adopted by May 1 to comply with NYS law. This year, the Village is on schedule to adopt the 2023-24 budget on April 24th after a series of public work sessions and a public hearing.

Budgets are basically the implementation of planning, priorities, and choices. The Board of Trustees is responsible for setting those priorities, making the difficult choices and finally, adopting a balanced budget. However, this process is never easy. There are always costs that can’t be controlled like required NYS pension contributions, conflicting priorities, and long-standing policies and practices that are difficult to change. Juggling all this and staying within the State mandated tax cap so we can receive our rebate checks is akin to a high wire act over shark-infested waters.

In the end, the Village budget translates to your Village property taxes. Let’s look at the current year for a better understanding of where your tax dollars are going and how your taxes are calculated.

· Village taxes are approximately 25% of your total property tax bill. Your school taxes are the highest portion of your tax bill with Mamaroneck School District residents at 55% and Rye Neck District residents at 60% of their total tax paid. The remainder are various County taxes, town taxes and the library tax.

The 2022-23 Budget

Expenses (Appropriations) $41,576,803

Less Revenue Other than Property Tax -13,455,388

Less Use of Reserves -600,000

Balance to be raised by Tax Levy $27,521,415

· The top three expense categories are Personnel (salaries and benefits) at 70%, Contractual Expenses at 20% and Debt payments at 8%. Just these three classifications add to 98% of the budget.

· Clearly, at 66%, the top revenue source is the property taxes we pay. User fees such as licenses, permits, recreational program fees come in second at 14% of revenue. Sales tax revenue is 11%. Like other municipalities in Westchester County, we get a share of the County sales tax based on our population (not the amount of sales tax collected by Village businesses)

· How are your property taxes calculated? It’s basic math based on your property’s assessed value. The tax rate is calculated per $1,000 of assessed value. The total assessed value of all the taxable property in the Village is $4,514,192,104. Divide this by $1000 and then divide the Balance to be raised the Tax Levy by the result: $27,521,415 divided by 4,514,192 for a tax rate of $6.0966 per $1,000 of assessed value. So, if your property is assessed at $700,000, your Village taxes are $4,268 this year. Renters don’t see the direct impact of any tax hikes in their rent – at least not until it’s time to renew their lease.

Tax levy increases have been under 3% each year since 2010. With costs continuing to rise, we’ll have to wait and see what will happen in this coming year’s budget.

Note: The source for all budget figures is the Village of Mamaroneck Adopted Budget, currently available on the Village Website HERE.