The Village of Flower Hill’s Board of Trustees was presented Monday evening with a tentative budget of $4,272,773 for the 2022-23 fiscal year. 

If approved, the budget would represent a 1.19 percent decrease from the current budget.

However, the budget calls for a 1.5 percent rise in property taxes. “There’s a slight decrease in revenue as we feel rising interest rates caused a slowdown in real estate activity,” Mayor Brian Herrington said. “And in order to maintain revenues at that level in the budget year over year, we’ve included a slight tax increase.”

The biggest cut in expenditures is a reduction of $100,000 for paving projects, bringing the amount  to $300,000. 

“During the first year of COVID, we kind of held back on our paving projects,” Herrington said during the special meeting Monday. “We weren’t sure if money was going to get cut or not so it rolled over and allowed us to do a little more last year. This number gets us down to the $250,000 to $300,000 range that we normally do per year.”

The tentative budget also represents, for the first time since 2013, the addition of two capital reserve accounts for new equipment.

“One of the pickup trucks needs to be replaced,” Deputy Mayor Randall Rosenbaum said. “To do it right it’s probably about $70,000 to $75,000 for a new truck with plow attachments and such. I don’t think we need it right away, but it is something I think we should put a reserve fund for.” 

 Rosenbaum said the board may also need to look at saving money for a payloader. Village officials said the village’s current one could have been replaced in 2011 but due to good maintenance and low usage it has been kept in service. 

“If we start saving a little every year, I think we can do well,” Rosenbaum said.

Additional capital projects include replacing the walkway in the park and potentially a safer walking path for Middle Neck Road. 

“By putting money away every year, I think we can tackle these projects without having big hits to our budget,” Rosenbaum said.

Trustees will take public comments on the budget and discuss it further at their next board meeting on Monday.