Cut Bank council approves slate of levy and assessment resolutions and continues preliminary budget hearing

The Cut Bank City Council on a unanimous voice vote approved a package of resolutions to levy funds and assessments for several city services and moved to continue the public hearing on the 2025–26 preliminary budget to Sept. 22, 2025, at 6:30 p.m.

Council members approved resolutions that the meeting record identifies as: resolution 2025-16 (repealing a prior resolution and restarting the mill-levy language), 2025-17 (permanent levy for fire capital), 2025-18 (levying voted mills as required by cited statutes), 2025-19 (intent to fund police capital), 2025-20 (special assessment for street maintenance, districts 1–4), 2025-21 (special assessment to fund lighting districts), a permissive medical levy resolution for employer group health insurance (transcript reference 2025-26), resolution 2025-23 (Park Maintenance District 1 funding), and resolution 2025-24 (adopting the preliminary budget for fiscal year 2025–26). Each item was moved, seconded and carried by voice vote during the meeting.

Why it matters: council actions set the dollar amounts and mechanisms by which the city will seek local funding for capital projects and ongoing services in the next fiscal year. Council members noted a recent change in state law that requires ballot language to state dollar amounts rather than traditional “mills,” a procedural change that affected how several resolutions were drafted and presented.

What council discussed: during a detailed review of the preliminary budget the council examined multiple line items. Highlights included an increase in the professional services line from $18,000 to $36,000 to cover contract attorneys and special legal work, a $15,000 addition related to dilapidated buildings within facilities administration and an overall $60,000 net increase in that area, a $50,000 increase for building materials, changes to the training budget, and enterprise fund adjustments for water and sewer operations tied to a multi-million-dollar water project that the city expects to fund largely with grants and loans. Staff told the council the large water project item is estimated in the budget at about $1,541,000 and is expected to be reimbursed by grant revenue and loans when drawn.

Public comment and procedure: the clerk/treasurer affirmed that public notices were published Aug. 27 and Sept. 3, as required by Montana law, and the clerk attested to having publication receipts. No oral or written public comments on the preliminary budget were recorded before the council voted to continue the hearing. The presiding official read the continuation motion into the record and the council set the next hearing date for Sept. 22, 2025, at 6:30 p.m., citing the applicable Montana Code Annotated subsection referenced at the meeting.

What’s next: the public hearing will resume on Sept. 22, 2025, at 6:30 p.m., when members of the public may again comment on the preliminary budget. The resolutions passed tonight establish the requested funding mechanisms to appear on the ballot or to be collected as assessments in the coming fiscal year.