The Marlborough Town Board set a public hearing on their tentative 2021 town budget for Monday, October 12 at 7 p.m. that can be viewed on zoom. Last Monday the board made it clear that many items and details have not yet been finalized and additions and subtractions are still expected to be made before the final budget for next year is approval.

The board said the tentative tax levy for next year is $6,192,904 for the General Fund and Highway but still slips under the 2 percent tax cap by $73,634 or 1.18 percent. The board expects adjustments will be made in the coming weeks.

Supervisor Al Lanzetta said for several weeks he has been working with Councilman Scott Corcoran and Budget Director Christine Wilklow on the details of the 2021 budget.

“It’s a very difficult year, especially on the revenue side; we’re at bare bones,” he said, pointing out that the town’s insurance has risen by 14 percent ($110,000) and they expect pension contributions will also increase.

"We’ve asked a few departments to trim some of their budget for 2021. I just found out today that Mobile Life wants to meet with us and because of covid they haven’t had the number of calls that they usually have and we really depend on those calls for our budget and their budget,” he said.

Corcoran said, “We’re making our best case of what we believe where we’re gonna fall this year; that’s all we can do right now.” He suggested that a home assessed at $400,000 may see a $12 increase and a $200,000 home may see a $6 increase overall from last year.

“Having said all the problems that we have, if all those numbers stay true, I think that’s pretty good for what we’ve accomplished working with the numbers for the past few weeks,” he said. “So we’re hoping we can stay within those numbers.”

Corcoran thanked the Police and Highway departments for seeing where they might be able to make some budget cuts, “and they came back with a lot of good suggestions and I thank you guys. You helped out the taxpayers.”

Lanzetta said the board is at a point, “where the budget is pretty easy because we can’t cut anymore.” He said the town is waiting to hear on a $50,000 grant through NYS Sen. James Skoufis but because of covid-19 all of that has been put on hold in Albany.

Lanzetta said the town is moving forward despite all of the uncertainties.

“We’re pretty blessed and our fund balance is in good shape. The Town of Marlborough, unlike a lot of towns, never deferred anybody, we never laid anybody off and we continued going,” he said. “People worked hard, like the Town Clerk, the Assessor, the Building Department, the Planning Board, the Budget Director and the Police Department. I mean we kept plowing through this thing. Kudos to everybody and we’ll get through this one too; an outstanding job done by everybody, so thank you very much.”