The Chittenden Solid Waste District board on Nov. 19 acknowledged receipt of a proposed fiscal year 2027 draft budget and sent it forward for committee review and a public hearing, district officials said.

John Valpara, CSWD director of finance, described a new budgeting workflow that aggregates spreadsheets into NetSuite and said staff built the draft around a set of explicit assumptions: a 4% baseline inflation factor, a 10% increase budgeted for health insurance and an assumed roughly 3% reduction in inbound volumes at the district’s materials-recovery facility (MRF). Valpara said staff budgeted an average commodity rate (ACR) of about 75 for FY27 after Q1 FY26 showed an ACR near 72, down from about 110 a year earlier.

"I think this is gonna give us a a more, more workable budget that will allow some better analysis as we see some of these variations," Valpara said.

Staff said the draft also proposes modest increases in operational prices tied to regional market conditions: raising the MRF tip fee to $95 per ton (from $90) to stay within the market range, and increasing the organics-recycling-facility (ORF) tip fee to about $74 per ton (up from about $70), the first ORF increase in three fiscal years. Valpara said staff will revisit these numbers as more data arrive.

Executive Director Sarah told commissioners the draft does not propose a municipal assessment for member towns. "We are not budgeting for municipal assessment," she said, adding staff will notify town clerks and legislative bodies and that the finance committee will meet in February for a line-by-line review. Under the district charter, the board must prepare a budget by Dec. 1, hold a public hearing no later than Jan. 31, and member municipalities have 45 days after notice to act; nonaction counts as approval.

The board moved and seconded a resolution to acknowledge receipt of the draft budget; the motion passed on a voice vote. Staff said they will present a revised draft to the finance committee (Feb. 11) and then to the full board in March, followed by the required public hearing and the member-town review period.

What happens next: the finance committee will examine the draft in a full-day review; staff will adjust assumptions (ACR, CPI, health-insurance projections and volumes) as new information becomes available before the public hearing and eventual member-town votes.