Southington Budget Season Ends Monday With Likely Tax Hike

SOUTHINGTON, CT — With some debate, but no changes, the Southington Town Council officially adopted a 2023-24 town/school budget, one that will deliver the largest tax hike in recent years.

With six separate votes, the GOP-led Southington council, which owns a 6-3 edge over Democrats, finalized town and school spending for next fiscal year Monday night.

The fact the budget season is, now, officially over was not lost on local officials, who've been working on this for months.

"Well, we're done for this year on the budgets," said a relieved Victoria Triano, the council chairperson and a Republican who also thanked her colleagues on the council for their efforts.

Democratic Councilperson Valerie DePaulo also issued kudos to colleagues, town officials and the public.

"This is the fourth budget that I've been on and they're very tricky. With all the work that everybody does, it just really helps," DePaulo said.

"I also would like to thank all of the residents who came here to speak. I known that's a difficult thing to do. When residents participate, even if we don't agree, its really good for us to know how residents are thinking. I know a lot of residents came forward on the board of ed budget. I just want them to know that we really appreciate that."

As part of this spending package, the mill rate will go up by 1.23 mills this year to 30.36, a 4.22 percent tax increase, according to the town.

If your home is assessed at $200,000 — for example — the proposed budget would increase your tax bill this year by $246.

The Town of Southington's 2023-24 budget plan is a combined $173.49 million town/education/debt service budget, which is 6.62 percent larger than current spending or $10.77 million larger than this year's total budget.

It was approved in six separate votes on portions of the spending package, most of them with minimal discussion Monday night.

But the education budget came with some debate.

• The largest budget approved by the council was a $110.46 million spending plan for the Southington Board of Education, a $6.04 million or 5.79 percent increase.

The vote was along party lines, 6-3, with Republicans out-voting Democrats who expressed concerns about how some of the funds were being used for education.

Here Democrats took a fiscally conservative look by questioning the use of non-recurring dollars (such as Covid relief funds) for items in the budget that would need to be funded next year, when no such funds would be available.

"We are, potentially, using funds that we know will not be there next year," Democratic Councilman Christopher Palmieri said. "I think its irresonsible to use any source of revenue that is non-recurring."

DePaulo agreed. "We're questioning very specific items here that we think are going to cause problems down the road," she said.

But council Republicans said they were assured by the Southington Board of Finance, which is controlled by the GOP, that Southington wasn't creating a proverbial "fiscal cliff."

Simply put, a council majority said they trusted the work of the finance board, which scrutinized the budget before sending it to the town council for a final vote.

Republican Councilman William Dziedzic spoke to Palmieri about his concerns, saying Palmieri's opinion shouldn't supercede the analysis of the finance board.

"Chris, you're substituting your judgement for the elected board whose job it is to make sure we have a judicious and a conservative budget process," Dziedzic said. "Why did the public elect a board of finance?"

• Of the budget plan, $13.1 million was for debt service, a $2.1 million or 19 percent increase.

This was approved with minimal discussion along party lines, 6-3.

•$49.93 million was for general government, a $2.63 million or 5.55 percent hike. It was also approved with minimal discusion.

It was decided via two votes, with the council taking out the recreation department budget and voting on it separately.

This was so Palmieri, a part-time worker in the rec department, could abstain from that part of the spending plan. This was OK'd via a 6-2-1 vote, also along party lines.

The rest of the general government budget was approved 6-3 along party lines.

• Council members also approved three other budgetary components: A sewer department fund via a 9-0 vote; an animal control budget via a 9-0 vote; and one year of the town capital improvement plan via a 6-3, party line vote.

Tuesday's budget adoption ends a long process of gathering dhttps://patch.com/connecticut/...ata, discussion options and receiving public input.

A public hearing late last month revealed very mixed opinions on spending from a litany of speakers at the April 24 Southington Town Council public hearing.

Some urged budget support, especially for education, while others expressed concern about the spending increases and the accompanying tax hikes.

From May 8: 'Big Budget/Tax Decision Tonight For Southington Council'