KINGSTON – The Kingston Common Council held its 2018 public budget hearing Monday evening and very few residents showed up. Only two people spoke about the spending plan.
The biggest share of $42.5 million budget, as proposed by Mayor Steven Noble, goes to public safety and general government: 48 percent and 16.6 percent of the total budget respectively. It will also be the third consecutive year where the proposed budget shows zero increase in the tax levy, remaining at $17.6 million.
As the public hearing portion has now ended, the budget will be sent
to the Finance Committee of the council for its final evaluations conducted
on a department bydepartment basis, said council President James Noble.
“One meeting they’ll dwell on the fire department, one will be city hall, one will be the police department and they bring the department heads in and then they speak to the budget and they look at their projected budget and they talk to them about it, mainly to see if there’s any other additional areas they can decrease the spending,” said council President Noble. “That will help us out, so that’s, kind of, what’ll happen.”
The Finance Committee is scheduled to have six meetings over the course of November, each regarding a specific department’s individual budget concerns.
If the budget is not vetoed by the mayor, the final budget will be voted on by the Common Council on December 5. Should the adjusted budget be vetoed at that time, President Noble expects another vote to happen around December 15 where the Common Council will have an opportunity to override the veto.
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