Towns across Summit County are diving into budgeting for 2023, and the town of Dillon is moving forward with its process to finalize a budget for next year.

The town will host a public hearing for the budget on Nov. 1, and council will vote to adopt in early December. For 2023, the town of Dillon is looking at several large capital projects over the course of the year. One is improvements to the Dillon Amphitheater, which is currently budgeted at $700,000. Others include a security camera project for $250,000, and $800,000 is budgeted for a walkability plan. 

About $1.7 million is put aside for the reconstruction of Lodgepole Street, $700,000 is planned for sidewalks along U.S. Highway 6, disc golf improvements are set at $50,000, cemetery entrance landscaping is budgeted at $100,000 and the resurfacing of several town streets is at $300,000. 

According to a memo from Finance Director ​​Carri McDonnell, revenues are anticipated to be down 0.6% while expenditures are projected to be up 8.15%. The water and sewer funds are balanced with a sewer fee increase of 2%. McDonnell said Tuesday, Oct. 4, that there will not be an increase in water rates.

“We’ll do a new rate study in 2024,” she said. 

Over the past several work sessions, staff has presented various parts of the town’s budget, including the general fund, 5A housing funds and the parking fund.

“(The marina fund is) balanced,” McDonnell said. “We have $2.1 million in revenues and $2.5 million in expenditures, of which $655,000 is for capital projects. We’ll actually get to replace (rental boats at the marina) and get them next year. We were not able to do that this year.”

Rental boats will cost about $316,000, and the town plans another $300,000 to go toward work on the marina master plan. There are three months of reserves in the amount of $472,691, leaving a cash balance of $49,768. 

As for the town’s housing funds, the town is projecting about $6.25 million to be reserved for workforce housing. Part of the housing expenditures is about $150,000 for the town’s down payment assistance program.

Instituted in Sept. 2021, the town will lend up to $25,000 or 10% of purchase price, whichever is less, to town employees to purchase their only home at a 1% interest rate over 20 years. Earlier this year, council approved increasing the loan amount to $75,000 per staff’s recommendation.

“We have had four (staff members) take that down payment assistance loan in the last eight months,” McDonnell said. “And I have one application, so it’s working beautifully. It’s working exactly the way we wanted it to. We’re pretty excited to get people into housing.”