2023 Vermont Statutes › Title 24 - Municipal and County Government › Chapter 105 - Consolidated Sewer Districts › § 3680. Annual budget, apportionment, assessment, taxes

§ 3680. Annual budget, apportionment, assessment, taxes
(a) The board of sewer commissioners of the district shall at each annual meeting present to the district its budget for the ensuing year, which shall include an estimate of the revenue from sewer rates and other sources, except taxes and the expenses for the ensuing year and the district shall appropriate such sum as it deems necessary for the expenses as are not disapproved (which disapproval may not include interest on or principal of any indebtedness created or assumed by the district), together with the amount required to pay any balance left unpaid from the preceding year as will not be met from the estimated revenues, expressing the sum in dollars in its vote. At its first annual meeting the district shall likewise vote a sum sufficient to pay any unpaid balance of expense, as defined in section 3674 of this title, which has been theretofore incurred by or on behalf of the district. Immediately following the annual meeting, the board of sewer commissioners shall compute the share of each member town in the sums so voted and give notice of the amount thereof to the legislative branch of each member town.
(b) The expense of establishing, acquiring, maintaining, extending, improving, and operating a sewer system for a consolidated sewer district shall, insofar as the expense shall not be met from the proceeds of indebtedness or from sewer rates, rents or other charges received from the use of such sewer system, be divided among the member towns in accordance with a formula agreed to by the member towns by vote at an annual or special town meeting or in the absence of any such agreement as follows: two-thirds of such expense shall be divided in the proportion which the total sewage flow to the inhabitants of each member town of the district bears to the total sewage flow in all the member towns in the last preceding full calendar year of operation of the district and the balance of such expense (or all of such expense until the sewage system has been in operation for at least one full calendar year) shall be divided among the member towns in the proportion which the population of each member town according to the last rental census bears to the total population of the district.
(c) The legislative branch of each member town shall, upon receipt of the notice of the share in the district expenses to be paid by the member town, assess upon the grand list of each member town, in addition to any tax previously voted thereon, a tax sufficient to raise the member town’s share in the expenses. The additional tax as so assessed shall be collected as are other taxes of the member town and be deposited in the account of the member town. The legislative branch of the member town shall order the additional tax to be paid over to the treasurer of the district as collected by the twentieth of the month after the taxes become payable. If by the end of its fiscal year a member town has failed to collect and pay over to the treasurer of the district a sum sufficient to pay the member’s share of the expenses of the district, the legislative branch of the member town shall assess a special tax of five percent on the grand list of the member town, or a multiple thereof as is necessary to make up the unpaid balance of the share, which special tax shall be collected as are other taxes of the member town. Upon the collection of the special tax, it shall be paid over to the treasurer of the district. If by the end of its fiscal year a member town fails to pay its share of the expenses of the district, or fails to make up a deficit therein from the preceding year as provided under this chapter, the board of sewer commissioners of the district may bring a civil action on this statute in the name of the district to recover from the member town twice the amount of the share of the member town that remains unpaid, and upon judgment may levy its execution against any of the real or personal property within the member town. (1967, No. 318 (Adj. Sess.), § 9, eff. March 22, 1968.)