By Devin Monk
reporter@ltview.com
After undergoing a number of cuts a plastic surgeon would admire, the Bee Cave City Council entered the final stretch for planning next year’s budget.

 At Tuesday night’s regular meeting, council members approved setting the upper limit of the city’s property tax rate for fiscal year 2009-10 at .02 per $100 of assessed property value, which is its current rate, to generate an estimated $163,000.
City officials based this rate on the Travis County Appraisal District’s total taxable value of all property in Bee Cave at $816.58 million for 2009, compared with $814.31 million in 2008. The city’s effective tax rate is .022, a rate that if approved would require a public hearing, but less than the rollback rate of .0814.
“All the other taxing authorities that can go up [in rates], are going up,” Mayor Caroline Murphy said.
City staff members presented a preliminary budget for 2009-10 that told the story of sales tax revenues that fell $1.22 million short of projections and the impact on each one of the city’s departments that have resulted in layoffs, reduced library hours effective Sept. 1, and other sacrifices.
In Bee Cave’s original 2008-09 fiscal year budget, the city projected $4.5 million in net revenues. It amended its budget to a projected $3.48 million, but as of this month, the city had generated in $3.37 million at 96.7 percent.
Its 2008-09 budget set out $5.5 million in expenses but the city amended that to $4.24 million. Thus far, the city’s expenses are $3.78 million at 89 percent of the cycle.
Planners have tweaked possibilities based only on confirmed residential developments for next year, rather than including uncertain projects.
The city’s preliminary budget for 2009-10 anticipates $3.54 million in net revenues with $3.53 million in projected expenses at an over/under expense of $12,738.
Council member Mike Murphy said he appreciated all the work city staff members put into drafting the preliminary budget, but wondered if the city might be overanalyzing it.
“Yes, we have been really working hard in the last couple of months to try to manage this budget. I’m beginning to think – don’t take this wrong – that we might be over-refining and overthinking what we are up against,” Murphy said.
“That’s what I’ve always done – I’ve refined up until the council approves [the budget],” City Administrator Frank Salvato said.
Salvato vowed to present a balanced budget for council members to review on Sept. 8 and consider for approval Sept. 22.
Murphy advocated taking another look at the budget three months after the fiscal year begins and making adjustments then, if necessary.
“I think it’s time to take our best guess,” he said.