Town administrator presents Rising Sun’s proposed FY27 budget, highlights sewer debt and infrastructure needs

At the May 7, 2026 meeting of the mayor and town commissioners, the town administrator presented the town’s proposed Fiscal Year 2027 budget and flagged major liabilities in the water and sewer funds tied to long-term loans and legacy wastewater infrastructure.

The administrator told commissioners the town’s real estate tax ‘‘is about 46 cents for every $100 of assessed value,’’ and said that Rising Sun currently brings in roughly $1,162,000 a year from property tax revenue that underwrites police, public works and other general services. He traced the town’s tight finances to a water-and-sewer moratorium from about 2005 to 2019 that limited development and depressed assessed values for years.

On utility finances, the administrator said water and sewer are run as proprietary funds and that the FY27 projections incorporate the town’s annual 5% water/sewer increase plus an expectation that about 50 new homes will connect to the system by June 2027. He cited recent figures for the water fund including FY25 receipts of $998,265, a prior budget estimate of $1,153,734, year-to-date collections of $960,423.88 and a projected year-end total of $1,280,565.17.

Debt service is a large pressure on those funds, the administrator said. On the water side he cited annual USDA loan interest of $95,770 and principal payments of $174,394; on the sewer side he said combined annual interest and principal exceed $500,000. He warned that those payments reduce the funds’ capacity to build reserves.

The administrator also described rising laboratory and sampling costs at the wastewater plant. He said testing and sampling was budgeted at about $29,302 last year but that the town’s third-party consultant projects testing costs could reach about $92,315 because of increased sampling needs caused by sludge and algae originating in an on-site lagoon.

Decommissioning the lagoon and replacing sludge-management equipment is central to the town’s plan to reduce operating and compliance costs. The administrator said the town had estimated lagoon decommissioning at about $1.5 million and that a FEMA-funded grant program the town applied to (roughly a $5.5 million award package for lagoon decommissioning and associated MS4 stream work) was reported as being reinstated after a temporary pause. He said the town also has applied to the Maryland Department of the Environment and pursued federal earmarks to cover remaining costs.

The administrator told commissioners the wastewater treatment plant and associated systems were ‘‘treating above and beyond what is required’’ and that the town receives an MDE performance grant of about $34,000 annually for high-quality treatment; he added the recent testing anomaly tied to lagoon carryover did not affect that grant.

For the general fund, the administrator presented projected revenues of $3,581,382 and expenses of $3,575,451, yielding a small surplus (approximately $5,931). He noted the town does not have a six-month operating reserve and described the FY27 proposal as conservative, intended to maintain services without raising property taxes.

Personnel and capital items in the proposed budget include hiring one additional police officer, adding a shared clerk position for administration and police, filling a public works vacancy, and adding one code officer when development activity increases. Capital plans include replacing a dump truck (estimated at roughly $135,000 under state contract) with financing options that would spread payments over 7–10 years.

The administrator said the town’s website vendor is exiting the market and recommended a lower-cost, user-friendly replacement and new permit software with AI-enabled tools to streamline permit review and customer requests. He also described adopting a community-engagement platform (See My Legacy) to manage event registration and volunteer coordination for recurring events such as Winterfest and Sunfest.

On the water tower, the administrator described multi-hundred-thousand-dollar costs to repaint and sanitize the structure and said the town is renegotiating a 25-year cell-carrier lease to increase annual revenue and to limit carriers’ ability to sublease space without town approval.

Commissioners did not take any formal votes at the meeting. They asked for time to review line items and agreed to return with notes; the administrator said the budget does not have to be adopted until June 30 and recommended follow-up budget work before final adoption.

The budget introduction session closed with no public presentations or votes; the board moved on to scheduling and adjourned.