Groton — During a virtual public hearing at 7 p.m. Thursday, the town manager plans to present a proposed fiscal year 2021 budget of $134,837,141. It represents an increase of $5,784,395, or 4.5%, over the current year’s budget.

The meeting will be held virtually via Zoom and will be broadcast as usual, Town Manager John Burt said. The town announced that it is holding its public meetings virtually due to concerns over the coronavirus, and is providing Zoom link and call-in information under each meeting at bit.ly/GrotonVM.

People can send in comments, either in advance of or after the hearing, by email to council@groton-ct.gov or by mail to 45 Fort Hill Road, Attn: Town Manager John Burt, Groton, CT 06340.

Burt said by email that the increases in the budget proposal primarily are due to increased health care costs and bond debt for the Groton 2020 school plan. The budget does not add any new programs or services, nor does it reduce any.

The budget includes one proposed new position of a school resource officer for the new consolidated middle school, he said.

As part of its capital improvement program for next year, Groton is proposing to fund its share of repairs to the North Stonington Road Bridge in Old Mystic, after many residents contacted the town manager about it. Stonington, however, is putting $15,000 in its proposed budget to close the bridge.

According to the budget proposal, capital projects include replacing and repairing sidewalks, improvements to Sutton Park, funding toward completing the community dock project, a bike path from Knoxville Court to Sutton Park, equipment upgrades to help with “excessive humidity” at Northeast Academy Arts Magnet Elementary School, and funds to complete the site plan for a new fire training site behind the Town Hall Annex, among other projects.

The budget proposal would mean the tax rate for 2021 would be 25.65 mills, a 1.48 mill increase over the current 24.17-mill rate, Burt wrote in his budget message to the Town Council and Representative Town Meeting.

Groton “has been collecting higher than expected revenues in recent years, so it is proposed that $1,500,000 of the Fund Balance be used to fund proposed FYE 2021 expenditures which will maintain the Town’s Unassigned Fund Balance Level at 16.9%,” Burt wrote.

The budget proposal is broken down into the following components:

• Town operations: $37,896,179, an increase of $2,164,872, or 6.1%

• Education: $77,934,550, an increase of $496,460, or 0.64%

• Capital/debt service: $10,766,482, an increase of $2,506,713, or 30.3%

• Outside agencies (regional and health and service agencies): $1,846,101, an increase of $8,321, or 0.5%

• Subdivisions: $5,993,829, an increase of $549,384, or 10.1%

• Contingency: $400,000, an increase of $50,000, or 14.3%

A full copy of the budget proposal is available at bit.ly/GTB2021.

The Town Council is slated to begin its department-by-department budget review sessions on Saturday.

At Tuesday's Committee of the Whole meeting, several councilors mentioned that they received correspondences from people regarding the budget, and said it will be important to carefully review the proposal, as people face financial hardships brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

k.drelich@theday.com