A majority of the Augusta City Council voted Thursday to approve a $91 million city budget that cuts more than 20 school department positions, limits city library services, delays hiring for several public safety jobs and reduces the scope of the city’s recreation programs.

Five of the eight councilors — At-Large councilor Annalee Morris-Polley and Joshua Lilley, Ward 2 Councilor Kevin Judkins, Ward 3 Councilor Michael Michaud and Ward 4 Councilor Eric Lind — voted in favor of the slashed budget.

The cuts reduce the amount to be raised through property taxes to a 5% increase over last year, which still amounts to the largest increase this decade.

Cutting $6.6 million was necessary, councilors said in budget meetings this spring, because of rising cost of living and an ongoing tax revaluation that is expected to shift the burden of property taxes much more heavily onto homeowners from commercial property owners. A larger tax increase could force some Augusta residents out of their homes, they said.

The incomplete revaluation obscures the exact impact to individual property owners. Some property values, especially for homes, could more than double, while others may stay relatively close to level.

Augusta’s property tax rate — preliminary due to the ongoing revaluation — would be $15.02 per $1,000 of assessed valuation.

Mayor Mark O’Brien said the council’s decision Thursday reflected a citywide, collective responsibility and “not just a pet program or a pet department.”

“We have to take into consideration the whole context of what’s going on in the economy nationally, in the state and locally,” O’Brien said. “We have to take into consideration the revaluation that’s coming along, which is lurking in the background and is going to impact each homeowner in the city of Augusta and business owner in the city of Augusta.”

Thursday’s vote came a week after more than 200 students walked out of Cony Middle and High School to protest $3.1 million in cuts imposed by the city council on the school board.

Students marched 2 miles to City Hall to oppose the introduction of mandatory pay-to-play in school sports and the elimination of four school social workers, five education technicians, a school clinician, a first-grade teacher, a fifth-grade teacher, the Latin language program, a dean of students, the reintegration specialist and the middle school music teacher.

Several students spoke to the council Thursday on the proposed cuts, including some who participated in the walk-out. Rekha Goonesekere, a Cony senior who serves as the student representative on the school board, said her adolescence would not have been the same without the programs councilors decided to cut.

“Keeping the property taxes lower isn’t going to save money in the way that we initially think it is,” Goonesekere told councilors. “Really, what we’re doing is we’re just shouldering that burden onto somebody else, whether that be our students, whether that be our community in general, when it comes to our libraries, when it comes to our parks, when it comes to so many of these services we see.”

At-Large councilors Stephanie Sienkiewicz and Courtney Gary-Allen were joined by Ward 1 Councilor Eric Austin in voting against the spending slash.

Sienkiewicz and Gary-Allen joined students in their walk-out and have been consistent in their calls for limiting cuts to school funding.

“I don’t hear our residents coming in and saying, ‘Raise my taxes to the ceiling,'” Sienkiewicz said. “I hear our residents coming in and saying, ‘We find a lot of value in these services.’ These are important services. They raise the quality of life in the city of Augusta. We get more out of them than we put into them in tax dollars.”

Sienkiewicz called on the city to begin its public-facing budget process much earlier next year.

Given the extraordinary interest shown by the public in this year’s deliberations — she said more than 100 people gave public comments — the City Council should avoid putting itself in a last-minute decision-making crunch next fiscal year, Sienkiewicz said.

Voters still have an opportunity to weigh in on school spending via the June 9 referendum.

Along with the school budget ballot, voters will receive a second sheet asking for feedback on the spending level. If the budget is shot down by voters, city leaders hope to understand whether “no” voters hope to see more or less money allocated to the Augusta School Department.