From left, Lakewood Village Trustee Ben Troche, Mayor Randy Holcomb, and Trustee Ellen Barnes go over budget numbers Thursday at a work session.

LAKEWOOD – With many cuts across all departments, village trustees have carefully pared down their tentative 2025-2026 spending plan.

A public outcry at the April 14 meeting, and receiving incorrect numbers from the town of Busti assessor led to the board’s cuts. Three people from the public attended Thursday’s budget work session, and the board discussed line by line ways to reduce the spending plan.

Trustees said they had listened to village residents, and being totally transparent, held a budget workshop session Thursday.

“We are kind of at a bare bones budget (right now),” Trustee Ellen Barnes said. “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.

Mayor Randy Holcomb said April 14 that at the next trustees meeting, there will be a reduced version of the budget.

“The entire board is charged with creating the most equitable budget possible, Holcomb said. “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.”

The tentative 2025-2026 spending plan is now $5,579,515 from $5,762,081, and the tax levy or the amount to be raised by taxes is now $2,403,074 from $2,587,640.

Now trustees will vote whether to adopt or not, the tentative budget at their next meeting, Monday, April 28.