From left, Lakewood Village Trustee John Shedd, Trustee Ben Troche, Mayor Randy Holcomb, Trustee Ellen Barnes, and Trustee Nancy Jones, conduct village business Monday. P-J photo by Michael Zabrodsky

LAKEWOOD – Lakewood Village Board members have unanimously adopted a 2025-2026 budget.

The spending plan was pared down from $5,762,081 to $5,674,015. The tax levy or the amount to be raised by taxes now is $2,403,074, a reduction from $2,587,640.

At the April 24 budget work session, the trustees listened to the residents, and continued their work of paring down the spending plan. During the work session, the board of trustees discussed line by line ways to reduce the budget.

“We are kind of at a bare bones budget (right now),” Trustee Ellen Barnes said at the April 24 meeting. “We need revenue.”

Both Barnes and Trustee Ben Troche said the most budget cuts came from the Lakewood-Busti Police Department, and the Department of Public Works.

“Thank you the public (residents) who have fielded so many questions, and have come to so many meetings about this, and your eyes helped us discover a couple things and the changes were made,” Troche said Monday.

Holcomb said previously that the entire board is charged with creating the most equitable budget possible.

“And none of us (trustees) take this lightly. That is exactly why we are having this meeting to trim this budget as much as possible and still have a financial plan that sustains each department and the health and well being of all of our full-time and part-time employees and Lakewood residents. The budget begins with the department heads submitting their budgets, then combining them all to create an entire village budget.”

Trustees also passed the law to override the New York State Tax Cap.

In other business:

Trustees learned that the village website lakewoodny.com address will change to lakewoodny.gov, and Southern Tier West is providing the update.

Trustees rescinded an earlier resolution to apply for a $200,000 bond anticipation notice. The notice was to help pay for feasibility studies for the village hall, and police department as well as the Waterfront Revitalization Project.