Total municipal budget to drop 12 percent.
By: Kara Fitzpatrick
ROCKY HILL The Borough Council adopted a 2005 municipal budget Monday, and although it is 12 percent less than last year’s, residents will be faced with a 10-cent increase in the tax rate.
This is the first tax increase in eight years.
The $882,965 budget of which $387,966 will be raised through property taxes will raise the borough tax rate from 53 cents to 63 cents per $100 of assessed value.
With the 2005 budget, the owner of a home assessed at the borough average of $211,546 will pay $1,326 in municipal taxes $214 more than last year, or an increase of 19 percent according to figures provided by the borough. When the budget was introduced, Mayor Brian Nolan said the tax increase is necessary to replenish the borough’s surplus.
Since 2000, he said, the surplus has dropped from about $600,000 to $314,000 as of Dec. 31. The 2005 budget will use $288,000, which will leave just $26,000 in the surplus account if it is not replenished.

