Utica Common Council adopts 2025–26 annual estimate, sets tax budget at $35,761,462

The Utica Common Council voted 9-0 to adopt the city's annual estimate for fiscal year 2025-26 and to set the general city tax budget at $35,761,462.

The vote followed a sequence of procedural motions to reconsider and amend four ordinances and an adjustment to the aggregate tax budget. Council members first reconsidered and amended several line items and account numbers in previously introduced ordinances, then returned to vote on the annual estimate as revised.

Among the amendments approved during the meeting, the council amended Ordinance No. 26 of 2025 (Department of Public Works, central garage) to correct an account number, changing the account listed from 55640 to 51640; the amendment passed on a 9-0 voice vote. The council also amended Ordinance No. 51 of 2025 to revise two "from" and "to" lines, replacing $745,124 with $720,142 and $669,745 with $644,763; that amendment passed 9-0. An amendment to Ordinance No. 57 of 2025 (interfund transfer) was put to a recorded vote that the transcript reports as nine no votes on the amendment; the transcript records the tally as "9 nays," and the amendment is recorded here as not approved by the council.

Councilmembers also reconsidered Ordinance No. 30 of 2025 (an infrastructure line) and proposed a revision to that line; the transcript records a 9-0 negative vote on the amendment. Later in the meeting council members moved to add $35,000 to the aggregate tax figure, producing a final tax-budget figure the clerk read as $35,761,462. The council then adopted the annual estimate as modified on a 9-0 vote.

The annual estimate document discussed at the meeting was described in the record as the board of estimate and apportionment's submission of estimated revenues and expenditures for the coming fiscal year, including amounts related to the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) entitlement program. The council noted that the figures presented in addendum A to the estimate are the amounts that supersede line-item estimates in the base document and that those figures are "in the nature of estimates and are not to be considered appropriations." The formal adoption at the meeting sets the tax budget to be raised by general city tax for the fiscal year but does not itself appropriate detailed spending amounts beyond the estimate.

The council concluded the meeting after the adoption vote and a brief motion to adjourn.