Although they still had about 5 meetings left to pass the budget, future discussions were cancelled after Perth’s councilors gave the thumbs-up to the $6,609,372 budget in principle during the first budget committee meeting of the year that took place on the 21^st of January.

Jorgen Hoeven, director of corporate and environmental services, as well as Perth’s treasurer, thought that the first meeting would be a kickoff of sorts. He never expected to get the budget passed so fast.

The budget for 2010 is a bit higher compared to last year’s $6,247,035, but this is due to a 5.8 percent for the municipal portion of taxes. When this factor is combined with the proposed new tax rates for the county and school board, it results in an “at-the-counter” rate that’s lower by an estimated 1.3 percent.

However, final tax figures won’t be made public until the county and school board make the final decisions with regards to their respective budgets.