Portsmouth Budget May Increase By 5 Percent, Residents Speak Out

PORTSMOUTH, NH — On Wednesday city residents spoke against the proposed 5-percent increase in next year's city budget. If passed as proposed, municipal portion of the tax rate would increase by 74 cents per $1,000 property value — an average Portsmouth homeowner with home worth $424,200 would see a $313 increase on the annual tax bill.

"It's a large increase," said City Manager John Bohenko. "But I'm probably sure this budget will be adjusted." A significant portion of the increase would come from contingency for collective bargaining agreements. Bohenko said that Portsmouth currently has 12 union contracts that are set to expire by the end of this June, and the City Council is aiming to approve the new contracts before then.

Portsmouth resident Charles Griffin said he hopes councilors will not feel rushed to sign an agreement by the June 30 deadline. "I hope that when push comes to shove, that you will be able to reign them in," he said, speaking about the upcoming deliberations with union representatives.

"I have a fixed budget. I can't just say, 'give me 5 percent more for my retirement,'" said Brian Lachance, who spoke against a 5-percent budget increase at Wednesday's budget public hearing.

At the hearing, Bohenko presented a total budget of $120,039,950 for the next fiscal year, compared to $114,295,207 approved for this year. About $1.12 million of the increase would be contingency for additional costs for the 12 unsettled contracts. Salary increases due to contractual cost of living adjustment are also expected to go up by 2 percent.

The next fiscal year begins this July. The Portsmouth City Council is trying to adopt next year's fiscal budget by its June 3 meeting. Several budget work sessions with a public comment period are planned in upcoming weeks.

Police and Fire departments are requesting new staff, and the School Department hopes to hire three people. The budget also contains about $181,000 in retirement costs, and the potential health insurance increase of 4.6 percent. Also part of the budget is an additional $167,290 in spending on "rolling stock" such as ambulance, cruiser, highway equipment and public works vehicle costs, and a $272,520 increase to replace information technology equipment.

"We had an attack on our system last year that took a lot of time and effort and money to correct, but we were fortunate enough to have insurance that covered most of that. But we are not always going to be able to be covered by those types of things," said the city manager.

The City Council's next public dialogue session will take place Monday, at 6:15 p.m. at the City Hall.