Operating Budget = $27,700,000
Debt Service = $865,000
(per page 100 of the 2025 Warrant)
Debt Service Ratio = 3.1%
(= 0.865 / 27.7, before any new debt)
Tax Levy = $22,800,000
(about 85% of the budget falls onto the taxpayers to fund (the rest comes from fees, state aid, etc.)
Your Property Assessment = $,000 Your Age (optional)
Start by entering your property assessed value, if you take the RTE, and your Age (optional).
You can lookup your assessed value here: https://www.axisgis.com/truroma/ by entering the address
Your Current Property Taxes ≈ $____ per year for the Property assessed at $1,000,000
This is approximately % of the Town Budget of $27.7M, and % of the Tax Levy of $22.8M
MA Proposition 2½ limits increases to 2.5% without overrides and exceptions
has a recent history of voting on overrides and exceptions, resulting in spending growth frequently above 5%.
The budgets for 2026, 2025, and 2024 were 4.67%, 6.34%, and 5.91% higher than each prior year respectively, for an average of 5.6%.
The tax levy can be increased above 2.5% by the adoption of an override. An override provision allows the voters of the town to raise additional revenues by the specific amount. This can be accomplished by placing an override question on the ballot in an election and approving the measure by a simple majority of voters. The increase approved by the voters then becomes part of the base for calculation future yearsโ levy limits.
The tax levy can also be increased by the adoption of debt exclusion. The exclusion provision allows the voters of the town to exclude bonds or debt issued for municipal capital improvements for a specified period of time. Learn more
Key Historical Financial Facts
| Fiscal Year | ||||||||||||||
| Tax Levy ($M) | ||||||||||||||
| Growth % | ||||||||||||||
| COLA % | ||||||||||||||
| Budget ($M) | ||||||||||||||
| % from Taxes | ||||||||||||||
| Res Tax Rate | ||||||||||||||
| RTE % | ||||||||||||||
| Your Past Taxes | ||||||||||||||
| Your Future Tax Projections (before any new debt) | ||||||||||||||
| FY 1-10 | ||||||||||||||
| Your Taxes 1-10 | ||||||||||||||
| FY 11-20 | ||||||||||||||
| Your Taxes 11-20 | ||||||||||||||
| FY 21-30 | ||||||||||||||
| Your Taxes 21-30 | ||||||||||||||
Assumptions
What If you vote for the proposed future Capital Improvement Projects (CIP) below that will add to the Debt?
| FY2026 | FY2027 | FY2028 | FY2029 | FY2030 | 5 Year Total |
| $5,519,417 | $37,707,250 | $20,063,000 | $1,235,000 | $1,747,000 | $66,266,667 |
Calculate the impact of New Debt by entering or clicking an amount below.
This is a simple way to factor in the proposed CIP by simulating voting for all, part, or none of it.
Farther down, you'll be able to customized this 5-year plan if you like.
Curious how bond details impact Debt Service & Property Taxes?
You can experiment with rates and years below.
These figures will be used to project debt service.
The Collins Center recommends a target of 5%
"10% is a rating service eyebrow raiser."
Debt Service: $M โ Budget: $M ๐ฐ %
Details from page 18 of the 2025 Warrant.
Most of this debt was borrowed recently -- about 3 years ago.WHAT IF you vote to cut or add projects proposed in the 5 year Capital Improvement Plan?
See the <
| FY2026 | FY2027 | FY2028 | FY2029 | FY2030 | 5 Year Total | ||
| projected borrowing | $5,519,417 | $37,707,250 | $20,063,000 | $1,235,000 | $1,747,000 | $66,266,667 | |
| Voter CUTs ($M) | - | - | - | - | - | ||
| Voter ADDs ($M) | + | + | + | + | + | ||
| What If ($M): | |||||||
| GRANTs ($M) | - | - | - | - | - | ||
| Net Debt ($M) |
You can enter CUTS in capital by Voters at Town Meeting
and/or ADDs to the capital resulting in increased borrowing.
Cuts and Adds will update the Capital budget and place the result in the What If row.
You can also enter any GRANTs expected.
Grants will reduce the What If budget and place the result in the Net Debt row.
| years | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | |
| ending | FY2030 | FY2035 | FY2040 | FY2045 | FY2050 | FY2055 | |
| Forecast($M): | see 5-yr CIP |
= | = | = | = | = | |
| Annual Debt Service($M): |
|||||||
| Your Annual Share($): |
$ | $ | $ | $ | $ | ||
| Debt Stack Tier: |
C | D1 | D2 | D3 | D4 | D5 |
Enter a forecast of capital expenditure borrowings for each 5-year period.
This will not show in the Debt Service Ratio for the first 5-year period, but will impact your taxes for the subsequent 25 years.
Let's look at all these debt numbers graphically.
The Debt Stack shows the various tiers of debt. Each tier represents a different year of issue, with its own annual debt service costs over time.
The debt tiers are shown below as blocks stacked on top of each other, with the most recent debt at the top.
The height of each block represents the amount of the debt. The width of the block represents the years it will be before the debt is paid off.
The debt tier code (A to D) is shown in the upper left corner of each block, and corresponds to the debt details you entered in the sections above.
The sliders and buttons below are used to display year-by-year forecasts of both the amount of debt and the debt service costs for that year.
The buttons will play a short animation when Play is clicked. The sliders dragged to move the animation frame by frame.
A: Owed Debt (already borrowed) | B: In-Process Debt (authorized but not yet borrowed) | C: New Debt (from the proposed 5-year Capital Improvement Plan) | D: 30-year forecasted debt
The Budget Components table shows the major components of the budget, in both $K and % of budget.
Year over year changes in these components can provide insights into the town's financial health and priorities,
and are color highlighted for easy identification (see the color legend at the bottom).
Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) are on a calendar year basis. To calculate the COLA for a specific fiscal year, we average the prior calendar year with the year the fiscal year ends to estimate the COLA for the fiscal year.
The Comparisons will be between the Town and other towns on the basis of key financial metrics.
That includes Spending Growth Rate (SGR), Debt Service Ratio (DSR), Taxes, and other relevant indicators.
The End