NEWBURGH – The 2023 Newburgh City budget prepared by City Manager Todd Venning and Comptroller Janice Gaston comes in at $63.78 million, up from $54.5 million in 2022.
The spending plan proposes creating a fire commissioner position, higher salaries for police officers if a new contract is reached, and additional code enforcement officers.
Venning said that given rising costs and inflation, it was a difficult budget to craft.
“When the comptroller and I started the budget, just to do the exact same as we were doing last year, we saw increases on average of 20 percent, so on a $54 million budget, just to breathe the same air you were breathing last year, it was $10 million more,” he told city council members Tuesday night.
Despite that, Venning is proposing lower property tax rates in the general fund; however, the water rate will increase by six percent, the sewer rate will increase to 108 percent of the water fee, and the sanitation fees will rise by five percent.
The city council will now spend the next six weeks scrutinizing the spending plan before adopting it.
