LYNN — Mayor Jared Nicholson said he is excited to present a balanced budget for fiscal year 2025 at the City Council’s meeting on June 11.
“This really continues the fiscal discipline that we have exhibited and have been building on over the last few years as a city,” Nicholson said.
Nicholson’s proposed budget is $517,267,001. He said the city started the budget process from a structural deficit this year.
“We projected a deficit when we carried forward all of the expenses with contractual increases and expected revenue, so we had to make cuts to the projected expenses in order to ensure that was balanced,” he said.
Nicholson said an example of cost-saving measures that allowed the city to decrease its expenses was moving inspectional service contracts in-house by having city employees take on that work instead of external vendors.
As a result of the city’s fiscal discipline over the last couple of years, Nicholson added, the city has built up a reserve of free cash. A portion of that money will be spent on one-time expenses, including 16 police cars, a new fire ladder truck, and two to three heavy vehicles for the Department of Public Works.
“We, importantly, still have the ability to make really valuable capital investments through debt and through free cash,” Nicholson said. “And that has been a struggle for the city for some time, to be able to have that capacity, and it has been a huge backlog of capital needs.”
He said the reconstruction of the Fayette Street fire station, which is scheduled to begin in August, will be paid for through debt financing.
Nicholson added that the Pickering Middle School project “is on track and built into this budget.”
He said approximately $60 million in bonds will be issued by the city over the next two to three years to fund the construction of the new school, which he said is part of the city’s effort to address outdated and overcrowded classrooms.
The Massachusetts School Building Authority’s decision to increase its cap capacity and adjust reimbursement rates has reduced the city’s share of the project from a projected $85 million in FY24 to just less than $63 million, pending final approval, according to Nicholson’s annual municipal budget proposal.
Nicholson thanked everyone who helped strategically determine the budget for FY25.
“We really appreciate everyone’s effort to help us through that in a way that allows us to deliver for our residents. The council will play a critical role in the budget process and particularly with Council President (Jay) Walsh and the chair of the Budget Committee, Councilor (Brian) LaPierre,” he said.
