TI Adopts $1.7M Budget With No Dues Increases

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Stephen Raucher

Congregants at Tikvat Israel gave their unanimous approval June 5 to the synagogue’s budget plan for 2016-17, which includes no increases in membership dues or fees. The operating budget will $1.7 million for the next 12 months.

Treasurer Stephen Raucher, who presented the plan at a congregational meeting,, called it a balanced budget.

The budget’s largest sources of revenue are tuition payments from pupils enrolled in the early childhood center and membership dues and fees, which together constitute the majority of the expected income. Revenue also will be generated by a series of fund-raising activities and a newly signed three-year lease with Seaboard Region USY, which is renting office space on the second floor of the education wing. Fees for Bar/Bat Mitzvahs, rental use of the social hall, memorial plaques and High Holidays seats were left unchanged.

The budget plan includes a new membership incentive for young couples and young families – a deeply discounted first-year membership charge of $500.

Raucher thanked the hard work of the budget committee that he chaired, saying the panel of about a dozen members committed to nine two-hour work sessions in developing a sensible fiscal-year budget.