Rye Town Council approves $7.71 million 2025 budget

December 19, 2024 at 2:37 a.m.

After a month-long public hearing on the 2025 Rye Town preliminary budget was opened in November, the town council adopted the spending plan with little input from the community.

The $7.71 million budget, which will go into effect Jan. 1, 2025, and run through Dec. 31, reflects a $215,000 increase over last year. It was unanimously approved by the council at their meeting on Thursday, Dec. 12.

Though both expenses and revenue are slated to grow by 2.9%, monies are to be pulled from the Town’s fund balances to stay under the tax cap of 3.2%.

Based on the average 2024 single-family homes assessment in each village, provided by Town Assessor Charles Zaba, a Port Chester homeowner with a house assessed at $641,000 can expect a town tax bill of $256. A Rye Brook homeowner with a home valued at $1.03 million would be charged $403. The tax represents a $6 and $8 increase over last year’s bill, respectively.

The $3.92 million collected from homeowners and $3.20 million raised through other revenue streams will be supplemented by $580,000 from the unrestricted fund balance, $255,000 more than last year.

It’s a number that Rick Buzin, a Rye Brook resident who has been active in various municipalities over the years, felt could be increased for the sake of taxpayers.

“I’m not a big fan of the use of reserve funds for operating expenses,” he said during the public comment period on Thursday. “It’s not a good look, because once you do it once, it may wind up getting you to use it as a backup for future years.”

The sole resident to publicly speak on the budget added that he was uncomfortable with the size of the Town’s reserve fund.

“As per the Westmore News, the unassigned reserve fund is close to 60% of one year’s budget,” Buzin said. He expressed hope the council would pull more from the account to lower the taxpayer burden.

It was a point Town Supervisor Gary Zuckerman countered by saying the Town is responsible for making other municipalities financially whole when residents neglect to pay their taxes.

“Our obligation between the school districts, the villages and the county is nearly a quarter of a billion dollars,” he said. “And that necessitates us to entertain a larger fund balance than other entities would.”

The Town’s planned spending remains relatively flat compared to the 2024 budget. Most of the increases are personnel related, including spikes in employee benefits and salaries.