Aspen manager unveils $175 million recommended 2025 budget, $5.9M in supplemental asks

City Manager Sarah presented the city of Aspen's recommended 2025 operating and capital budget at the council work session Sept. 30, proposing a $175,000,000 net appropriation—an increase of roughly 13.5% over 2024. She told the council the rise is “notably due to capital for the most part” and that the proposal includes $5,900,000 in supplemental operating requests and a recommendation for nine additional FTEs in 2025.

Finance Director Pete Strecker said the city is projecting about $200,000,000 in revenue in 2025, split roughly half from taxes and half from fees and services, and that staff is tracking better than earlier forecasts in 2024. Pete cautioned that staff has modeled a 15% reduction in the tax base for 2026 as a placeholder related to potential airport disruption, but said the city’s near-term outlook remains sound.

The staff package highlights three major areas of supplemental pressure: affordable housing, environmental initiatives, and customer-focused government improvements. “So they're really that affordable housing by far,” Sarah said, describing where the big supplemental requests are concentrated. The presentation also lists large capital projects—lumberyard, Castle Creek Bridge scoping, utilities work, and the armory—that account for much of the increase in the capital budget.

Council members asked for more detail on certain claims and figures, including evidence behind a reported 30–50% shortening of first-round permit review times and the composition of the projected fund balance growth. Pete committed to follow-up materials and noted that much of the apparent fund-balance growth is encumbered for identified capital uses. The council directed staff to bring the armory schematic-design action item back for a formal decision on Oct. 8.