The Washington Township Trustee Advisory Board met on Tuesday.
The board discussed updates made to the 2023 budget. They had proposed a budget estimate at the last meeting that had been a drastic change from the 2022 budget and received negative feedback. They met with Washington Township Trustee Christian Rust to make adjustments that would be more agreeable and increased the total budget from a little over $710,000 to $832,913. While the board agreed that these new numbers are far better for the new trustee, there was concern for the DLGF and whether or not they would accept the updated, unpublished budget. Since the updated 2023 budget did not meet the deadline it is unpublished, meaning the DLGF will only approve the $710,000 published budget, considering the board approves their budget. If the board were to not approve this budget then the DLGF would reapprove the 2022 budget but they would not receive the 5% tax levy. The board approved to adopt the higher, unpublished budget of $832,913 with the understanding that the DLGF would most likely cut it to what was published. The board came to this decision because they did not want to lose the tax levy, but also wanted it to be noted that they attempted to raise the budget.
There were questions on how they came to the original, drastically lowered budget in the first place, which was determined to be because of government budget predictions. There were also questions on why salaries were cut to only about 40% of the 2022 budget, considering that salaries are not legally allowed to be changed during an election year. This decrease not only lowers the trustee’s salary, but everyone else who works in the office as well.
Morgan Schofield
WTRE News
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