WATERVILLE — The City Council on Tuesday will consider taking a first vote on a proposed $64.8 million municipal and school budget for 2025-26.

The largest increase in the municipal proposal is reflected in a request to hire eight people, at a cost of $601,616, to help staff a third ambulance for the city’s fire and rescue department, and the department proposes staggering the hiring over several months this fall. Other proposed increases include a 5% pay increase for nonunion employees, at a cost of $62,039, and $72,000 for negotiated union pay.

The council will take a second, final vote on the proposal sometime this summer. If the budget were to pass as is, property owners with a median home value of $219,000 would see a $390 increase, or a $4,590 tax bill, according to acting City Manager Cornell Knight.

The tax rate is now $20 per $1,000 worth of assessed valuation and would increase to $20.96 of assessed valuation if the budget is approved.

The budget numbers could change, depending on what the council decides, city Finance Director Christina Therrien said.

The proposed municipal budget, which includes a $1.31 million county tax, is $30.6 million and the proposed school budget, $34.2 million. The current year’s budget totals $61 million.

Knight said in a memo to city councilors and Mayor Mike Morris that he is concerned about the plan to spend $2.45 million of the city’s unassigned fund balance, also known as surplus, to help lower the tax burden in the budget. The proposed budget uses 68% of the available balance over and above the minimum carryover, according to Knight.

“The city has a healthy fund balance but if revenues drop, it will add to the tax burden the following year to keep revenues level,” Knight said.

He recommends less fund balance money be used next year and that more money be directed toward capital and reserve accounts.

City policy says least 12% of the city’s most recently approved operating budget should be established as a minimum undesignated fund balance.

Therrien, the city’s finance director, said the amount raised through taxation last year was $23.3 million and with the proposed increase, it would be $24.59 million, a change of $1.28 million, or 5%.

“If you pull the ambulance piece out, it could be down under 3%, but that is a council decision,” Therrien said Monday. “We know that the county budget has passed. The school is pretty confident and solid with their numbers, when they came in.”

School officials presented their budget to the council recently. The Waterville Board of Education on May 12 voted unanimously to approve a proposed $34.2 million school budget for 2025-26. The board is expected to take a second, final vote in the coming weeks, after the City Council takes a final vote on the municipal and school budgets.

The school proposal represents a 5.97% increase, or $1.9 million, over the current $32.2 million budget. But the schools get revenues from tuition and state subsidy in the amount of $22.98 million, so school officials are not asking for $1.9 million in taxes, school Finance Director Paula Poolet said. Instead, they are asking the city for $144,782, a 1.31% increase over what was raised in property taxes in the current school budget. Pooler said 85% to 87% of the school budget is salaries and benefits. Health insurance costs also have increased.

Meanwhile, fire Chief Jason Frost said in a memo to city officials that if the request for more employees to staff the city’s third ambulance is not approved, he is “extremely worried about my employees here at the fire department and I am very worried about the citizens that we are tasked with keeping safe.”

He said the impending closure of Northern Light Inland Hospital is a big deal for the city and will greatly impact operations at his department. Inland is the only inpatient hospital in Waterville.

“I would never make such a big ask if I didn’t think that this is extremely important for the citizens of Waterville and for the men and women of the WFD,” Frost said.

He said the department expects to take patients by ambulance to MaineGeneral Medical Center in Augusta and Redington-Fairview General Hospital in Skowhegan at least 800 times a year, and that doesn’t include patients who say they do not want to be taken to Thayer Center for Health, which has an emergency department but otherwise is an outpatient center.

Every fire department in the state responding to as many calls as Waterville, and even those with fewer calls, have double the personnel and three ambulances running, Frost said.

“In short, we are doing more with much less now, and this department realistically cannot handle an increase in volume or major increase in call times,” he said. “The average amount of calls an employee does in Waterville is 178 calls per year, compared to Auburn, at 99 calls per year, and South Portland, at 109 calls per year.”

He said those are just two of the top 10 departments in terms of call volume, and Waterville is No. 7. Auburn is No. 4 and South Portland is No. 6.

The City Council will meet Tuesday at 6 p.m. in the City Hall Annex at 46 Front St.