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MURFREESBORO – The tax rate for Murfreesboro citizens will remain the same for another year.

The Murfreesboro Town Council approved their budget for fiscal year 2021-22 (FY22) during their regular meeting here June 23. A public hearing was held just before the vote, but no citizens chose to speak on the budget proposal.

Council member Jay Revelle motioned to approve, and Council member Sarah Wallace seconded. The vote was unanimously in favor.

Though there was little discussion about the budget before the vote, the council has held several budget workshop sessions over the past few months to discuss specifics and make changes as necessary.

For another year in a row, the ad valorem tax rate will be set at $0.66 per $100 of valuation. The tax rate has remained unchanged now for more than a decade.

“It is a balanced budget,” reported Town Administrator Carolyn Brown.

With an increase of $362,614 from FY21, Murfreesboro will operate on a total of $3,622,682 in the new fiscal year which will end on June 30, 2022. Those total funds are split between the General Fund and the Water and Sewer (Enterprise) Fund.

In the General Fund, the town will have $2,163,385 for the new fiscal year. That number is an increase of over $225,000 from FY21’s operating General Fund budget.

The departments which will receive the largest appropriations in FY22 include Police ($745,989), Sanitation ($317,926), Administration ($247,823), Recreation ($186,000), and Powell Bill ($160,100).

With the exception of Administration, these departments are all receiving higher amounts of funding than in the FY21 budget. Recreation ($171,500) and Powell Bill ($70,100) saw the biggest increases. The large recreation increase is in anticipation of a grant to facilitate more work on Murfree’s Landing.

In the Water and Sewer (Enterprise) Fund, revenues are expected to total $1,459,297 for the year. That’s an increase of $137,021 from FY21. The town council raised water and sewer rates last year in order to meet qualifications to apply for USDA grant funding to address aging infrastructure issues.

Each department in the Enterprise Fund showed an increase in allocations for FY22. The allocations will include $655,058 for Water; $500,362 for Wastewater Treatment; and $303,877 for Sewer. Water saw the biggest increase with over $101,000 more funds than in FY21.

Brown also stated that the FY22 budget contains a 2.5 percent raise for employees.

In comments at the end of Wednesday’s meeting, the council thanked Brown for her hard work in getting the budget ready for another year.

The FY22 budget will take effect on July 1.