Facing the possibility of a 20% tax levy increase, Washington County residents showed up in droves to a Friday morning Board of Supervisors meeting.
More than 200 people were watching Friday’s Washington County Board of Supervisor’s meeting online, and several hundred people showed up in person – enough so that four overflow rooms had to be opened in the county’s municipal building.
The 2025 tax levy was nearly $38 million, and initially county leaders floated a 40% increase for 2026. That’s since been lowered to a proposed 20% raise.
Finance Committee Chair Brian Campbell told the Glens Falls Chronicle that this year’s jump largely comes from using $3.8 million in fund balances in 2025’s budget.
Republican Assemblyman Matt Simpson was in attendance and said some pressure on the county comes from state mandated expenditures.
“Counties are required to pay a significant portion of New York’s MedicAid costs. I’m going to guess different parts of it are different reimbursement rates but it’s 75% is funded by New York state and the rest is on the counties. Unlike most other states where the state covers that entirely. This is the single largest mandated expense for all counties in New York state. Our safety net program, $3.7 billion. Counties must fund a share of the public assistance and welfare benefits as dictated by the state and federal eligibility rules,” said Simpson.
The meeting, which lasted for nearly five hours, saw resident after resident express frustrations over the proposal to override the tax levy cap of 2%.
Tim Havens said life has become unaffordable for everyone in the county. He proposed limiting the levy increase.
“Overriding the tax cap, to me, is like opening the barn door and letting the cows out. And once you’ve voted to override the tax cap you seem to have no limit. And so I’d like to see the introduction of local law D modified so that it does not allow us to exceed a 10% increase [of the tax levy] instead of just opening it up for free reign,” said Havens.
While some of the XX [how many total supervisors] supervisors supported the idea of limiting the tax levy increase, Hartford Supervisor Scott Hahn, a Republican, said he wasn’t in favor of any increases.
“I’m not for overriding the cap at all. They put that in writing. They made a law about it. So, why are we looking at these mandates like they’re more important than the tax cap? I think it’s time we start saying no to the state. And I know that’s a very complicated thing because there’s 25% here and 50% there, I believe if it’s not 100% funded by the state, their mandate not ours, then we need to start looking at every single line and put whatever the number is, $50,000 into that and they’re going to match it with $50,000 and after that we’re done,” said Hahn.
Easton Supervisor Daniel Shaw, a Republican, wanted to limit the increase to 10%.
“But if we don’t put a limit on what we can do with this tax cap, we’re going to have a problem. I want to amend this motion to set a cap of no more than 10% increase. And that forces us to be … more diligent,” said Shaw.
The board ultimately voted to override their tax cap after failing to pass an amendment to limit the raise to 10%.
The county’s finalized budget proposal is due by October 31st.
