On Tuesday, April 22, the Farmingdale Village Board of Trustees unanimously adopted the fiscal year 2009 budget.

According to Village Administrator Dave Smollett, the newly adopted 2009 budget includes appropriations of $5,665,544. This represents a 2.24 percent tax increase over last year's $5,656,667 budget.

"The average homeowner in Farmingdale pays about $1,200 per year in village taxes," Smollett explained. "This increase would equate to about $27 per homeowner."

Taxes per $100 of net assessed value of a home are $18.25, as opposed to $17.85 in fiscal year 2008.

Newly elected Village Mayor Butch Starkie said compiling the 2009 budget was not a difficult task.

"We hit the ground running," he said. "Immediately after the election, the village clerk presented me with a proposed budget. The new trustees along with Pat Christiansen and I met at a public meeting with each of the department heads and reviewed each line item. The trustees and I held subsequent meetings, called upon our department heads when necessary, and together proposed what we considered to be a fiscally sound budget to the public on April 14. The fact that Bill Barrett has a strong background not only in accounting but also municipal finance and both Cheryl Parisi and Ralph Ekstrand are successful in their business enterprises was a great asset to the budget process."

The board met with the department of public works staff and explained its desire to keep Main Street clean and add flowering baskets and planters.

Mayor Starkie said the thing he is most proud of with the budget is that they were able to keep their campaign promises and reduce the size of government.

"We have to do more with less," he added. "We all agreed we needed to work together and the board reallocated money within the DPW budget to address the staff's desires and needs to get the job done. I have heard from residents that they have already seen improvements on Main Street."

The board also met with the fire commissioners in order to address equipment upgrade and new truck requests.

Reductions in the budget came from the elimination of one full time and one part-time staff positions.

"We reduced the revenue that would be derived from fines from $570,200 to $475,200," Mayor Starkie said. "If we did not make any cost reductions, by reducing this revenue we would be required to impose a 3 percent tax increase."

The board considered this to be unacceptable and sought measures to eliminate this increase.

"Towards that end, we have asked all elected and appointed officials to contribute 20 percent towards their health benefit costs," he explained. "Deputy Mayor Pat Christiansen and I declined the pay increase that accompanies the position of mayor and deputy mayor which saved another $4,000 per year. We also budgeted more money to pay for tax certiorari refunds thereby reducing what we have had to borrow in the past to pay these refunds."

While Mayor Starkie said they didn't inherit any fiscal problems regarding the general fund from the previous administration, he did mention a concern over the financial condition of the water department.

"During the campaign it was pointed out that we went from a surplus of $560,000 in 2004 to a deficit this year that we believe will approach $100,000," he added. "It is costing us $1.2 million to pump and deliver water and we are collecting less than $1 million in water fees. We have only installed one half of the new water meters and to complete the project will require an additional $250,000. Even if we raise the water rates back to what they were four years ago, the additional revenue will not cover our costs to operate and complete the installation of the water meters to the remaining 50 percent of our residents. We will keep our residents informed as we move forward to correct this problem."

Mayor Starkie said the village will be working with local elected officials to see that Farmingdale is being considered for any county, state or federal money.

"Legislator Dave Mejias and Senator Kemp Hannon have been very helpful in securing us grant monies in the past which have been used to improve our parks and village hall/fire department structure," he explained. "I have reached out to Supervisor John Venditto through our own village resident, Councilman Tony Macagnone, to work on initiating a program whereby we may share services that would save both the village and town money. I am hopeful that the town can do the maintenance on our street lights for less that what we are presently paying to an outside contractor. I also want to explore with the Town of Oyster Bay their installing dumpsters behind the Main Street stores which would stop the refuse from being piled up on Main Street three days a week."

Overall, Mayor Starkie said he is very pleased with our low tax increase, especially considering the increased cost of utilities and contracted salary raises.

"The board worked tirelessly to achieve a financially sound fiscal budget without imposing an undue tax increase upon its residents," he added. "Our goal is to continue to provide our residents with the services they expect to receive by living in the village and at the same time not to impose any excessive tax burden."

The next village board meeting is slated for Monday, May 5 at 7:30 p.m. at Village Hall. For more information call Village Hall at 249-0093 or visit www.farmingdalevillage.com.