Town Board unanimously adopts 2022 budget

The Riverhead Town Board unanimously adopted it town budget for 2022 at last Tuesday’s meeting.

Overall, the budget called for a reduction in taxes.

“I want to thank the supervisor for giving us a budget with no tax increase,” said Councilman Tim Hubbard. He said the budget will not “put another burden on the taxpayers backs.”

Supervisor Yvette Aguiar thanked finance administrator Bill Rothaar for his work on the budget.

“It’s a good budget,” she said. “We gave raises if we needed, to our employees and we lessened spending in some areas.”

She added, “We didn’t lose any services and we didn’t lay anyone off.”

The budget had been the subject of a public hearing on Nov. 3 at which no one from the public spoke.

In the three funds that all town taxpayers pay into — general, highway and street lighting — spending increased by 2.08 percent, from $59.07 to $60.3 million.

The tax levy — which is the amount of property taxes raised, and is used to determine the state tax cap — decreased by 3.31 percent.

While those numbers represent the town taxes that all residents pay, there also a number of special districts that only some residents pay. That number is $100,048,100, which is up by about a half percent.