With little discussion, the Gardiner City Council unanimously passed its proposed budget for the fiscal year that starts July 1.

Through their votes, the Gardiner City Council approved a $6.12 million municipal spending plan as well as budgets for the city’s two enterprise accounts, for the Gardiner Ambulance Service at $1.49 million and for the city’s Wastewater Treatment at $1.6 million.

City officials don’t yet know what the property tax rate will be in the new fiscal year.

Denise Brown, finance director for the city of Gardiner, said Kennebec County has completed its budget, but the Gardiner-area school district budget will not be voted on until the statewide primary election on July 14.

The budget related items were approved on an emergency basis to allow them to go into effect by the start of the fiscal year next week. Otherwise, Brown said, they would go into effect 10 days from the date of the vote, after the start of the fiscal year.

During the budget process, members of the City Council expressed concern at the level of spending proposed and asked for reductions in city spending. The result is a budget that’s 2.4% higher than the current year’s budget.

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City officials also ratified contracts with the four bargaining units representing Gardiner city employees — Teamsters Local #340, AFSME Local 2011 General Unit Council No. 93, Gardiner Professional Firefighter’s Local 2303 and Gardiner Police Officers Association.

In addition to a minor change to health insurance language and a change to the firefighters contract to set the work week at 42 hours, the unions have agreed to a one-year contract with a 3% pay raise.

District 1 City Councilor Terry Berry said he wished the terms of the contract could have been for at least two years to allow for time to recover from the financial uncertainty posed by the global coronavirus pandemic.

As a result of widespread shutdowns of businesses, government offices and school buildings and other restrictions imposed by executive order, government officials expect that tax revenue from all sources will take a hit this year, and possibly next year as well.

Mayor Patricia Hart thanked both the unions and city management for their work on the contracts.

“We appreciate the unions’ work and we appreciate the management coming to agreement with the unions on a path forward, especially when it’s not clear what’s going to happen with the economy,” Hart said.

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