Present for the second Village Council budget session were, clockwise from top, Council members Brian Housh, Carmen Brown, Gavin DeVore Leonard, Kevin Stokes, Village Manager Johnnie Burns, Assistant Village Manager Elyse Giardullo, Clerk Judy Kintner, Solicitor Amy Blankenship, consultant Tiffany Heiser and Finance Director Michelle Robinson. (Video still)
Village budget projected to be at $558K deficit for 2026
- Published: November 6, 2025
Village Council held its second and final budget session on Wednesday, Oct. 15, when Council members were given the chance to make their case for including Council-sponsored initiatives in the 2026 budget.
The group began their meeting with the knowledge that next year’s budget is projected to operate at a deficit of approximately $512,000 — with municipal expenses totalling $5,365,902, and revenues projected at $4,853,812.
By the end of last week’s meeting, that projected deficit rose to about $643,999.
However, in the time since, Village Finance Director Michelle Robinson told the News that she and other Village staffers have reduced the deficit closer to what it was before Council members loaded on their 2026 initiatives.
Robinson said on Tuesday that the deficit is closer to $558,100 — down from an earlier estimation of $820,000.
Still, at the most recent budget meeting, Council approved funding the following in the coming year:
• $19,999.99 to be spent next July for an America 250 event, wherein the Village will celebrate with live entertainment and programming the United State’s semiquincentennial;
• $32,000 to support the Senior Center’s operations;
• $20,000 to subsidize YS Home, Inc.’s home repair grant fund;
• And $60,000 to cover the tap fees associated with the construction of phase two in Home, Inc’s ongoing Cascades senior apartment project.
In an effort to curtail increasing the projected deficit even more, Council voted against funding a new, over-the-street banner that would commemorate future YS High School class reunions, costing $1,000, as well as subsidizing the Fourth of July fireworks for $11,000.
Home, Inc. had also sought more funds than they were allotted. The affordable housing nonprofit had initially requested $12,100 for their home repairs initiative as well as $108,000 to subsidize phase two of building out the Cascades apartments — the latter of which was money on top of their request of the Village to waive tap fees, or those costs associated with connecting a property to the Village’s water infrastructure.
Both budgetary items from Home, Inc. were sponsored by Council President Kevin Stokes. Council members Carmen Brown and Brian Housh respectively sponsored the America 250 and the Senior Center requests.
Council members were broadly split in their votes on the sponsored initiatives to be included in the 2026 budget. Council Vice President Gavin DeVore Leonard, though, was unwavering in his “no” votes, until the Cascades-related request from Home, Inc. was deflated to only covering the tap fees, when he voted “yes.”
“I sit here feeling really frustrated with the people who have sat here for the last decades, who have gotten us to the point where we have to look at things this way,” DeVore Leonard said, apparently dismayed by the Village’s financial state and his hopes to try to rectify it.
To that end, DeVore Leonard struck his July 4 fireworks request from the agenda, as a way to hold himself “to the same standard.”
Housh suggested that the Chamber of Commerce — the local organization who took over the organization of the fireworks display from the Oddfellows in 2023 — could still fundraise for the event by reaching out to local businesses and supporters.
Other Council members weren’t as conservative as DeVore Leonard in their Council-sponsored requests for the 2026 budget.
Brown stressed the importance of the upcoming America 250 celebration — that the event would “build community” and be a chance for Yellow Springs not only to mark the anniversary of the country’s founding, but also to broadcast to the area the contributions Yellow Springs has made to the U.S. and beyond.
“Arts and culture always suffer when we start talking about budgets,” she said. “These are the things that literally hold communities together.”
Likewise, Housh spoke to the importance of the Yellow Springs Senior Center, and beseeched his colleagues to commit themselves to helping keep the organization financially buoyed.
“Over 40% of our population is older than 60,” Housh noted. “I don’t know how the Village would be able to substitute the transportation, health, socialization and other services that the Senior Center provides. They serve a very important part of our population.”
Stokes emphasized Council “putting its money where its mouth is” in supporting Home, Inc.’s efforts to build and maintain affordable housing in Yellow Springs when he introduced his initiative sponsorships.
“We have to do something to support what we value,” Stokes said of the Cascades project and the home repair grant. “There’s not a whole lot else being done to support those who need affordable housing and senior living. This is an opportunity for us to do some good — to help folks who are less privileged than us.”
As Stokes described, Home, Inc. intends to launch a home repairs initiative next year to “provide critical, healthy, safe, accessible and energy-saving repairs to low-income homeowners” in both Yellow Springs and the neighboring Vale — an intentional community beyond municipal limits.
The project aims to invest an estimated $674,100 to benefit 30 households; the initial ask of Council offering $32,100 to support these home repairs amounted to about 5% of the total amount.
The initial vote on giving Home, Inc. the full amount failed, but was followed by another motion made by Housh to offer $20,000, and only for home repairs in Yellow Springs proper — excluding the Vale. That motion passed by majority vote.
“This is incredibly important,” Housh said of Home, Inc’s home repair program. “Helping people to invest and save on energy is a great way to help people stay in the village and age in place. There is a return on investment here — we get property revenues.”
Of all the Council-sponsored initiatives before the group at their budget meeting, the $108,213 Cascades phase two subsidy and $45,655 in tap fee waivers were by far the largest amount requested for inclusion in the 2026 budget.
In a message to the News, Home, Inc. Executive Director Emily Seibel said the hefty request amounted to about 5% of the project costs, and that it was an amount that would “close the gap” on construction costs that have continually risen since the Cascades were first envisioned, and that the Ohio Housing Finance Agency has recently instituted new funding limits.
“We plan to apply in February 2026 to the state for approximately $1.3 million and hope to have all other funds committed to maximize our [application] score,” Seibel wrote. “We also hope to show local skin in the game to leverage state funding.”
Only a fraction of that “local skin” was shown at last week’s budget meeting.
Stokes initially moved to support phase two of the Cascades project for a total of $108,000, inclusive of eight tap fees. He and Housh voted “yes;” Gustafson, DeVore Leonard and Brown voted “no.”
Housh followed with a second motion, this time to fund only the eight tap fees for an amount of about $60,000, Finance Director Robinson later told the News, to account for fluctuating costs of materials.
That motion passed, with Gustafson voting “no,” and all the other Council members voting “yes.”
At the end of the budget session, Housh said he was proud of the trimming work he and his colleagues did.
“By my calculation, we trimmed Council initiatives by two-thirds,” he said. “I feel like we followed suit with the Village team.”
Robinson said earlier in the meeting that she likewise is optimistic.
“Even though we’re still showing a deficit budget, [Village Manager Burns] and I are going to work our hardest to make sure it’s balanced for 2026,” she said.
DeVore Leonard echoed this sentiment, and said that all the work the Finance Committee and Village administrators have done has made for an “easier path” for balancing the budget in future years.
“But there are these ongoing questions about managing capital expenses,” he said. “And continuing to balance our priorities — that’s really the hard work here. So, what do we want to invest in as a Village? It’s an ongoing question.”
Village Council will officially vote on the finalized 2026 budget in upcoming regular meetings; the group will review the budget as an ordinance, giving it a first reading on Monday, Nov. 17, and then a second reading and public hearing at a subsequent meeting in December.
The Yellow Springs News encourages respectful discussion of this article.
You must login to post a comment.
Don't have a login? Register for a free YSNews.com account.
No comments yet for this article.