ALTAMONT — At $2.46 million, the village of Altamont’s tentative budget for 2022-23 is up about $1,000 over this year’s adopted spending plan.

“This is by no means … our budget,” Mayor Kerry Dineen said during a recent budget workshop. “This is a very preliminary draft.”

But the Feb. 24 meeting did offer a few observations as to what next year’s spending plan might bring: fee increases for the Altamont’s summer recreation program; the village beginning to close its sewer-fund revenue gap; and a potential police pay raise. 

Altamont Police Chief Jason Johnston said his department is “pretty well set with the same [budget] number” for 2022-23, approximately $186,000, just like this year. 

But Altamont’s police officers are “tragically underpaid,” Johnston said. New hires are paid $15 per hour, and he’s looking to bump that number up to $19 per hour. Johnston said other area departments with part-time officers have starting salaries as much as 50-percent more per hour. 

Johnston wants to place his existing officers into pay tiers:

— $21 per hour for officers with five to 10 years of service;

— $22 per hour for 10 to 20 years on the job; and

— $23 per hour for officers with over 20 years, of which the village currently has just one. 

The department is currently saving money on personnel because Johnston has been working more hours as a patrol officer since becoming full-time chief in September. He estimated the department could save approximately $20,000 per year in personnel costs with him taking on more patrol hours. 

Since some shifts are hard to fill, Johnston said another time- and cost-saving measure the department is exploring is cutting back patrol coverage one day a week, from 15 hours per day to 10 or 12 hours. 

Fee increases are being proposed for Altamont’s summer program.

“This kind of brings us” in line with “what everybody else is getting for the same services and lessons,” Dineen said on Feb. 24.

Recreation

The fee for the village’s weekly camp is proposed to increase from $65 to $75 per person. 

With non-resident admission staying at $5 per person, the fee charged to non-resident children and seniors for admittance to the Bozenkill Park pool is slated for a two-dollar increase, up to $3 per child and senior. 

Seasonal family swim passes are proposed to increase from $100 to $125, while individual passes would stay the same, at $40 per person. 

Swim lessons for both residents and non-residents alike would increase to $10 per person. Water aerobics would increase from $35 to $50 for villagers and from $45 to $60 for non-residents. 

Superintendent of Public Works Jeff Moller told trustees on Feb. 24, “We had a major leak under that pool somewhere,” and he’s currently exploring whether it would be more cost effective to put in a new pool or to repair the current one.

Sewer fund 

The 2022-23 sewer fund — projected at $561,016, down from $565,412 this year — is set to be in better shape than in years’ past as the village will start to see an increase in revenues with the sewer-plant capital charge fee increase set to take effect in April. 

In 2013, the village upgraded about two-thirds of its Gun Club Road facility.

The upgrade came with $170,000 in annual loan payments. 

The village was flagged by the state Comptroller’s Office for borrowing from the general fund to cover sewer-related costs. The Comptroller’s Office had “notified us and said you have to do something about your rates,” village Treasurer Catherine Hasbrouck said in November, because the fund “has to be self-supporting.”

Every year for the past few years, the village has had to take $25,000 out of its sewer reserve to help pay back the bond on the sewer-plant upgrades. The board was told in March 2020 that more revenue had to be raised so the village could collect another $100,000 per year to help pay down the bond. 

Two years ago, $70,000 had to be borrowed from the general fund to balance the 2020 sewer fund. For this year’s spending plan, another $105,000 was budgeted to close the gap, according to village filings with the Comptroller’s Office. To further close the revenue gap, the board in December approved an increase in the twice-a-year plant-upgrade fee, from $45 to $100 per user. 

The board accounted for the $110 total per-user increase in this year’s budget, but the village won’t see any of that additional funding and instead will have to draw from its fund balance to close the budget gap, which for this year is actually closer to about $160,000, Hasbrouck told trustees on Feb. 24. 

The village will still need to allocate approximately $22,000 from its fund balance to close the gap for next year’s budget. Trustee Nicholas Fahrenkopf asked Hasbrouck, “Is this still going to be an issue with the Comptroller’s Office?” She answered, “I don’t believe so. I think that the big appropriated funds is what they were concerned about.”

Court

The village court won’t need as much money next year due to employee efficiency, Altamont Justice James Greene told trustees. With Court Clerk Stacy Loucks working in two other local municipal courts, the village benefits from all that experience since Loucks needs fewer hours to do her work. 

There’s a $13,000 budget-line item associated with Loucks’s pay, but typically $8,500 was spent. With the pandemic, the number has been closer to $5,000, Greene said.