Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, May 16, 1995                   TAG: 9505160069
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-4   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: NEW RIVER VALLEY BUREAU
DATELINE: PULASKI                                 LENGTH: Short

PULASKI PLANS TOWN BUDGET HEARING THIS EVENING

Formal budget adoption is tentatively scheduled for the June 6 council meeting. Council could adopt the budget as presented, or change any programs and amounts except expenditures required by law or for debt service.

The proposed budget is up by 16 percent, with 12 percent of the increase accounted for by a $122,313 increase in street maintenance funds.

No property or real estate tax increases are planned.

But increases have been proposed on water and sewer rates, and on the town's tobacco tax which would go from 4 cents to 10 cents on a pack of cigarettes. The average tobacco tax across the state is 12 cents a pack.

A 13 percent increase in water rates and 10 percent in sewer rates has been proposed, although some council members at Budget Committee meetings have called for those to be scaled back.

Council must also decide on funding for its new Board of Economic Development, as that initiative enters its first full budget year in search of an executive director. The council members must also decide whether to contribute toward such projects as restoration of the Pulaski Theatre building on Main Street.