The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
“While not a totally rosy picture, it’s not doom and gloom”
by Mark Reaman
While local government budgeting is rarely fun, it is the place that indicates the direction of any entity. Crested Butte is in the throes of organizing its 2027 budget and while there are a few speed bumps along the way and department heads are “scrubbing” their individual numbers, things are looking solid, even with a slight downturn in summer sales tax revenues.
Crested Butte finance and administrative services director Lauren Hawcroft presented the town council with the first 2027 draft budget at the October 5 council meeting. She first pointed out that revenues were anticipated to go from $22.6 million in 2026 to $29.1 million in 2027. Because the town’s biggest revenue source, sales tax, is anticipated to be flat or slightly down next year, the increase is tied primarily to grants.
Two big projects, the Red Lady Roundabout near the Crested Butte Community School and the Marshal’s Office expansion, were both not started this year and so will flow into the 2027 budget. Overall operating costs are expected to rise about 3% and the town won’t know what its insurance premiums will be until the end of the month, but Hawcroft has penciled in a projected 15% increase.
At the end of this year, the capital fund is expected to be short about $1.6 million, the street and alley fund will be in a $1.2 million deficit and parks, recreation and trails will be short about $380,000. But the town’s general fund will have about $8.3 million in spendable reserves so will be able to handle transferring $4 million to other funds in need while still maintaining a $4 million surplus above the state and council requirement for fund balances in 2027.
“The two big drivers for the general fund transfers to capital is the Red Lady Roundabout to which the town has committed $1.27 million and the Marshal’s Office which will cost us about $4.5 million,” Hawcroft explained. “After those, the next big capital decision is the Community Hub idea in the old fire station which would come in 2029 or 2030.”
Staff has estimated that project to be about $6.6 million.
“Looking at the latest numbers, the budget is surprisingly positive,” said town manager Dara MacDonald.
MacDonald continued, “The capital fund starts to regain some balance until the Station One/Community Hub project and the possibility of another affordable housing project in town. While there’s always a big negative number in the capital budget, the numbers look good. The increase in the street and alley mill levy helped. If the excise tax were to pass this November, we’d be in really good shape. While not a totally rosy picture, it’s not doom and gloom.”
Some other highlights of note include a decrease of $21,755 for consultants in next year’s budget. It will go from $738,300 to $716,545. While the planning department has contracted with consultants to help develop things like the new zoning code and design standards, other, more regular consulting fees include things like $104,000 for parking management services (which is offset $55,000 by parking ticket revenue), IT service of $65,000 annually (plus a one-time cost next year of $65,000), Human Resources management consulting fees of $40,000, and $111,600 for grant writing consulting that has resulted in 23 awards worth $7.5 million to Crested Butte since 2023.
Software expenses will go up from $37,070 in 2026 to $134,388 in 2027 for the five departments discussed at Monday’s meeting. Overall, town software costs for 2027 will be $292,714. Personnel costs total $8.74 million and is 45% of the town operating costs. The council asked staff to provide more information about the total benefit package town employees receive before agreeing to a hike in wages to bring about half of the town employees into the appropriate level within their pay range based on experience. That would total $181,000 over the next three years. That would be on top of a 2% market adjustment for general town employees and 3% for marshals to bring pay ranges in line with peer Colorado communities. The 2027 budget proposal includes a 2% cost of living increase for all employees. Staff is not recommending merit increases for next year.
“We will continue to scrub through the budget,” MacDonald promised the council. “It’s a lot of work but there is more work to do.”
Hawcroft said staff would return to the council with more information and numbers at the November 2 council meeting.
