Oakland sees $11 million decrease in general budget

The town of Oakland’s Finance Director Gaby Leon said the town’s first budget workshop regarding the General Fund budget was overestimated by $11 million. 

Since the first budget workshop held Tuesday, June 23, Leon said the town’s taxable values have decreased for Fiscal Year 2026-2027. 

She said Orange County Property Appraiser provided the town with estimated taxable values of $1,037,422,455, which she used to present the first budget workshop. 

However, property appraisers overestimated it by $11 million. 

The town’s taxable values, which include real properties and personal properties, actually are $1,026,261,670. 

“Unfortunately, it’s never been overestimated by that much,” Leon said. “It’s usually only ever been by a million or two. This was kind of a big hit to our bottom line.”

Because the taxable values decreased, the fire assessment fee also decreased by nearly $122,000. 

While the fire assessment fee decreased, additions were made to the budget. 

Additions include $220,000 for Southern Oaks paving; $40,000 for the abandonment of Oakland Avenue Charter School’s septic tank; $30,000 for a new HVAC system in the town’s meeting hall; and $115,000 for fire fee and stormwater assessments. 

With all of these additions, changes and decrease in ad valorem revenue, the town was in a deficit of almost $200,000. 

To make the budget balanced, Leon pulled $300,000 from the reserves, leaving the reserves with a new contingency of $111,000. 

Changes to the budget also caused a shift to projections made for fiscal years 2027-2028 and 2028-2029. According to Leon’s new projections, the town will see a $352,690 deficit in Fiscal Year 2027-2028 and a $694,830 deficit in Fiscal Year 2028-2029. 

The town’s enterprise fund totals $10,814,000. 

The revenue is based on user fees for goods and services such as water, wastewater and solid waste. 

Leon said about $7.5 of the $10,814,000 is in grants, which means the money is untouchable, leaving the town with around $3.4 million to operate and support the wastewater, water and solid waste programs. 

Leon said the enterprise fund shows a 6% increase in water and wastewater revenues from last fiscal year. However, that’s only about $180,450 more. 

“We’re not bringing enough in than what we are spending in the enterprise fund,” she said. “We need to do a water study to see if we need to increase our rates to help pay for the water services and sewer services.”

Because of that, $30,000 was budgeted for a water-rate study. 

Other expenditures include $42,000 for utility repair experts to operate the town’s water plant, $25,000 for a Water Supply Work Plan update and $72,000 for upgrades to the town’s water system, SCADA.

The budget also includes a 3% cost-of-living adjustment for all employees and a 9.5% increase in employee health insurance costs. 

After all expenditures are accounted, the budget’s contingency is $142,351, which will go toward necessary additions to the budget or to unexpected expenses. 

Leon presented a $4,204,354 budget for impact fees, with $2,435,000 budgeted for projects and $1,769,354 in reserves. 

Expenditures include $150,000 for the Northwest Loop water design; an extra $10,000 for laptops and equipment for the Oakland Police Department; an increase to $60,000 for Oakland Nature Preserve’s pavilion; $75,000 to include additional water line work for hydrant upgrades; and $125,000 for sidewalk improvements to include a canal bridge. 

Leon also highlighted capital improvement projects expected to cost a total of $34,107,000 over the next five years. Projects are for parks and recreation, transportation, water and police.

However, Leon said these projects are dependent on Property Tax Amendment 3. If passed, the town would experience several budget cuts and might not be able to complete any projects on the list. 

The list includes $4,500 for IT equipment; $130,000 for the Comprehensive Plan update; $450,000 for Briley Farms alternative water connection; $220,000 for Southern Oaks paving; and other projects funded through grants. 

“Even if Amendment 3 doesn’t pass, the town still has to have money in order to fund these things,” Leon said.