The Philomath Budget Review Committee will hold its final meeting of the budget season Wednesday evening, taking up a contentious proposed city services fee and deciding whether to approve the city’s fiscal year 2026-27 budget.
The meeting is scheduled for 5:40 p.m. at Philomath City Hall and will also be livestreamed on the city’s YouTube channel.
The centerpiece of Wednesday’s agenda is a staff analysis examining what budget cuts would be necessary if the proposed city services fee — currently planned at $14 per month — were reduced or eliminated entirely.
The fee is designed to fund two priorities the City Council has identified for the coming fiscal year — increasing police officer salaries to be more competitive with neighboring departments and stabilizing the general fund’s unappropriated ending fund balance, which is used to cover city expenses between July and November before property tax revenue arrives.
At $14 per month, the fee would generate approximately $403,200, with $224,733 directed toward police salaries and $178,467 going toward the ending fund balance.
Staff prepared a reduction analysis showing the cuts that would be required at four lower fee levels — $10, $7, $5 and $0 per month. The analysis focuses on what city staff characterize as “sustainable” reductions, meaning cuts that reflect a genuine reduction in service or programming rather than simply lowering a budget number while expecting the same level of service to continue.
At the $10 per month level, generating $288,000, the city would need to close a $115,200 gap through cuts that include eliminating funding for the public art program ($10,000), reducing contributions to outside social service agencies ($16,000), cuts to education and training ($5,000), reducing expenditures on the downtown flower basket program ($3,800) and holiday décor ($5,300), withdrawing from the Mid-Valley Partnership ($3,000), reducing the tourism allocation from transient lodging tax revenue ($13,000) and reducing travel and meals to reflect lower conference attendance. ($2,000).
Out of the Land, Building and Equipment fund, cuts could include scaling back building upgrade transfers for the library ($21,468), City Hall ($1,172) and police facility ($34,460)— preserving only HVAC-related work.
Deeper reductions to the fee would require increasingly painful tradeoffs. At $7 or below, staff’s analysis shows the city would need to reduce the police salary increases themselves — directly undercutting one of the council’s stated budget priorities for the year.
In supporting documents, Finance Director Mike Murzynsky and City Manager Chris Workman argued that the city’s budget pressures are not the result of overspending, but rather inflation, rising personnel costs and a structural problem with Oregon’s property tax system that affects municipalities statewide. They noted that cities and counties across Oregon have increasingly turned to fees, levies and bonds to balance their budgets.
The committee will also take up approval of the full budget document and the ad valorem property tax rate before adjourning for the season.
Public comments may be submitted in writing or electronically, and residents are also welcome to attend in person.
The committee meeting agenda includes time set aside for public comments.