Mayor Lanigan’s proposed 2027 budget holds the city tax rate, water, sewer, and trash rates where they are. If your assessment didn’t change, the city’s part of your bill doesn’t either. But costs are still growing faster than revenue, so the budget plans to use about $3.6 million in savings and counts on $3.2 million in temporary state aid arriving again. If that aid doesn’t come, the general city budget is about $2.1 million short. This episode walks through the budget book section by section, from police and trash to the $100 million sewer plant and a capital plan that grew from $174 million to $272 million.

The council holds its public hearing Wednesday, October 14 at City Hall. If you have a question, take it to your councilor before then. The full budget book and capital plan are posted at https://www.romerightnow.com

Rome has about 10,000 water service lines, and after 18 months of letters, door hangers, and news coverage, about 200 residents had reported what their pipe is made of. So in May 2026 the city approved $1 million in bonds just to find the lead lines, before a single one gets replaced. That's the smallest bill in this episode. City debt grew from $77.7 million in 2021 to $113.7 million in 2025, a fire truck quoted at $650,000 is now carried at $1.25 million, $21.7 million in dam work is already approved, and the sewer upgrades tied to Chobani still don't have an official price. Unlike salaries or equipment, debt payments can't be delayed, trimmed, or negotiated. They come due on a date somebody already wrote down. With the 2027 budget now out, the question this series has been building toward is simple. Rome is facing serious financial challenges in the upcoming years. What did the mayor decide to do about it?

On January 28, 2026, the Rome Common Council spent a long stretch of a meeting debating $70,000 in window blinds for City Hall. Later that same night, three transfers of money between city funds passed with no discussion at all. It looks backwards until you read the rule in the city's own audited statements: the council can't cut salaries, debt payments, or revenue estimates, and it can't add to any line. Every cost driving Rome's budget gap sits outside the authority of the Common Council. This episode also traces the one line in every budget book where the city writes down how much it needs to cover the deficit. That number has grown from $1.3 million in 2022 to $3.7 million in 2025. And a sentence from an April council meeting is slated to add more than $17 million to the existing debt.

Rome, NY takes in about 3% more each year and spends about 8% more. In 2023 the space between those two lines was $2,839,000. In 2025 it was $88,000. This episode starts back in the room on October 8, 2025, the one night all year the public hearing fills up. Residents argued over 2.59%, about $33 a year on a home assessed at $62,046, roughly nine cents a day. They also argued that the city increase doesn't arrive alone, stacked on top of a county increase and a school increase. Both of those things are true at the same time.

In 2026 the City of Rome, NY raised property taxes for the second year in a row. Even after the increase, the adopted 2026 budget plans to use more than $3.8 million from savings. In February 2026 I spent a month in the city's audits, ten years of state comptroller filings, and every budget I could get. In March I presented a report on a structural deficit and a declining cash reserve, thinking I'd found something new. I hadn't. Mayor Jeff Lanigan had laid out the problem in his September 2025 budget message, and he called this increase "not a trend, but a bridge."

In May and June of 2026, roughly half of Rome's voters said "yes" to the proposed 26-27 Rome City School District budget. While they acknowledge that there is still work to do, there is evidence of improvement, both in the classroom and in the administration. There is a strong argument to be made that the district is being responsible with tax dollars, and the problems that remain don't get solved by cutting the budget. Ultimately, enough of them voted "yes" to pass the budget in June. This episode speaks for that side of the argument, but it isn't my verdict, and it isn't the whole case. The other side of the argument is available here on my channel or at www.romerightnow.com.

In May and June of 2026, roughly half of Rome's voters said "no" to the proposed 26-27 Rome City School District budget. For them, it wasn't just about money. It was about feeling unheard and ignored. It was about trying every door the school said to open and finding most of them led nowhere. Ultimately, it was about trust, and the gap that still exists between the district and roughly half the voters in Rome. This episode speaks for that side of the argument, but it isn't my verdict, and it isn't the whole case. The other side of the argument is available here on my channel or at www.romerightnow.com.

In May 2026, Rome voted down the school's proposed budget. Then, in June 2026, Rome voters passed a nearly identical one. The margin was razor thin for both. Why? That's the question this episode tries to answer, and it doesn't rely on math alone. This is a complex situation where both sides are having a different discussion. I do my best to make sense of it based on the record.

(Aug 28, 2026)