Budget Workshop: Trustees to Talk Building, Code Enforcement and Planning Tonight

Should Port Chester make steep cuts to services or restructure some of its long-term debt to balance this year's budget?

Those are just two of the options available to the Board of Trustees in a lean budget year, when a still-sluggish economy, deep cuts in state aid and rising pension costs have put the village in the same financial bind faced by so many of its neighbors.

Without cuts or some clever financial wizardry, village homeowners face , raising the average property tax bill by $216.

While municipal officials look to trim a proposed $36 million budget, a looming school budget increase threatens to tighten the squeeze on Port Chester taxpayers. Confronted with – including slashed state aid for school programs and ballooning for retired teachers – Port Chester's Board of Education is floating a proposed budget more than twice the size of of the municipal budget, a figure that exceeds the payrolls of most mid-market Major League Baseball teams.

At $79.9 million, the proposed school budget would over the current year. If the school and trustee boards aren't successful in curbing those spending hikes, some property owners could pay about $1,000 more in combined school and village taxes when the next tax bill arrives.

At budget meetings for the district and the village, residents have pleaded with their elected officials to – or face voter wrath.

“Our taxes keep going up and it’s coming to the point where it’s impossible to keep a house here. Where is [our money] going?” Port Chester at last week's school budget workshop.

Likewise, homeowners took to the podium at last week's trustee meeting to warn of a mass exodus if officials don't take "radical" steps to ease the financial burden on taxpayers.

"I really would like to move out of Port Chester," resident Silvio Buccieri told trustees last Monday. "I've really had it."

Port Chester's Board of Trustees will meet with taxpayers for a budget workshop at 6 p.m. tonight at the , 222 Grace Church St.

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