City Councilors will be at Neighborhood Planning Assembly Wednesday night to take questions about the City budget and hear your ideas.

Community dinner at 6pm, assembly meeting starts at 7. First on agenda is Open Forum. Stand Up, Speak Out.

Here's summary of major budget issues:

The mayor and city council inherited a budget deficit of over $13 million, presenting the beginning of Mayor Mulvaney-Stanak's administration with a major challenge. The gap was initially thought to be around $9 million. Upon learning about the much larger budget gap, Mayor Mulvaney-Stanak immediately shared the news with staff, councilors and the public. Working with department heads and the Chief Administrative Officer, a budget was crafted that focuses on affordability for working people, prioritizes fair taxation and long-term stability, and is right-sized.

The mayor did her best to make this budget as affordable as possible -- with limited time and resources to do so. Her team is investigating ways to further reduce the property tax burden, so stay tuned for that.

Top priority: The Progressive Caucus and the Mayor's administration is looking to improve community safety, seeking ways to collaborate with regional, state, and federal partners who have access to additional resources we will need to succeed.

How will we close the budget gap?

1. Increasing revenue from money spent at hotels, entertainment, and restaurants, i.e. "gross receipts"

-The increase in tax revenue will amount to $4 per $200 (before taxes). The entertainment admissions and restaurant (meals and alcohol) increase amounts to $1 per $200 spent. This will be paid by people who stay at hotels and when they go out to eat.

-Gross receipts taxes are more tied to the ability to pay than property taxes which are not income sensitive, drive up the cost of housing, and are avoided by a huge percentage of owners of tax exempt property in Burlington, like UVM.

2. Property tax increases

-Voters authorized a property tax increase on Town Meeting Day in March. This budget does not use 33% of the approved increase - it uses gross receipts revenue instead. This is in an effort to limit the property tax burden for working people as much as possible.

3. One-time funds & other measures.

-While we are using one-time ARPA COVID relief and other one-time funds to help close the gap in the budget, Mayor Mulvaney-Stanak was able to significantly reduce reliance on one-time funds as compared to former Mayor Weinberger's original draft budget.

-In recent years, the City has relied on one-time funds to create and fund on-going obligations. This is not best practice, and Mayor Mulvaney-Stanak does not plan to continue this.

-Federal Opioid Relief funds will be used to deliberately move money to programs that help those struggling with Substance Use Disorder in our city.

This budget increases our investment in community safety. Community safety is a major priority for Burlington residents and businesses. We will focus resources and time on increasing safety support in our city in the following ways:

-Dedicating additional resources to support the Library.

-Continuing support for the Fire Department's Community Response Team.

-Hiring a temporary Senior Advisor on Community Safety in the Mayor's Office.

-Allocating $50,000 to address emergent health and safety concerns related to unsheltered homelessness in Burlington.

-Hiring additional Community Service Officers.

-Providing one-time recruitment funds for the Burlington Police Department

-Adding a Housing administrator position to the department of Permitting & Inspections.

Creative solutions are critical to the health of our city, fiscal health and overall health. A top priotity is the wellbeing of our city employees, the people we ask and need to do the vital work to keep the city running and improving. We recognize that austerity does not improve the health of the city. Despite an inherited budget gap of over $13 million, the administration will not be laying off a single worker.

To stay up to date on what's happening with Burlington Mayor Mulvaney-Stanak, the Burlington City Council, our state legislative agenda, and key policy initiatives:

~Sign up for regular emails from the mayor's progressive caucus here: https://vtprogressiveparty.nationbuilder.com/sign_up_for_the_burlington_progressive_email_list

~Have coffee and conversation with the Mayor first Thursday, 8am at The Bagel.

~ Discuss City issues with our Councilors at NPA on 4th Wednesday, at the Miller Center.