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City of Rensselaer
Population 9,421 (Census estimate 2025; 2020 base 9,208) popest-2025 ⓘ · Meeting coverage: documents
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General fund spending (incl. transfers out) exceeded revenues (incl. transfers in) in 2020, 2022, and operating funds overall spent more than they took in in 2020, 2022 (last 3 AFR years). Planned use of fund balance can cause this; check the adopted budgets.
OSC tax cap filings: proposed levy exceeded the computed levy limit for FY 2024 (by $326,340, override planned), 2025 (by $566,976, override planned), 2027 (by $17,017, override planned). Exceeding the limit requires a local law override (60% of the governing body).
Listed on OSC's FSMS 2025 not-filed (municipalities); last filed in time for a score: 2013. This is filing status, not a stress designation.
Source: fsms-notfiled-muni-2025 ⓘ
Compared with Capital Region cities
| Indicator | City of Rensselaer | Peer median | Percentile | Peers | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Operating spending per capita | $2,010 | $2,140 | 35th | 10 | AFR 2022, operating funds (our calc) |
| Property tax per capita | $938 | $626 | 95th | 10 | AFR 2022 real property taxes (our calc) |
| Debt per capita | $2,064 | $1,944 | 65th | 10 | AFR 2022 debt detail, year-end outstanding |
| Debt service % of operating spending | 7.7% | 7.5% | 55th | 10 | AFR 2022 (our calc) |
| State aid % of operating revenue | 9.3% | 12.5% | 25th | 10 | AFR 2022 (our calc) |
| Sales tax % of operating revenue | 18% | 18.9% | 35th | 10 | AFR 2022 (our calc) |
| Levy growth | 17.7% | 14.5% | 85th | 10 | 2021–2026 OSC tax tables |
Percentile = share of same-class peers in the region with a lower value. A high or low percentile is context, not a judgment. Sales tax for towns and villages is county distribution revenue.
Five-year picture
Our calculation from OSC AFR account data: all funds except custodial (T*), capital projects (H), fixed-asset (K) and long-term debt (W) groups, excluding interfund transfers and debt proceeds.
OSC AFR, fund A, revenues and other sources minus expenditures and other uses (our calculation). Planned use of fund balance appears as a deficit.
Year-end debt outstanding (OSC AFR debt detail) and debt service expenditures (OSC AFR).
Levy as reported in OSC's annual tax tables for the year shown.
OSC's own scores and designations. 'Not filed' rows mean the AFR was not filed in time to be scored.
Annual Financial Report series
| Year | Operating revenue | Operating spending | GF revenue (incl. transfers) | GF spending (incl. transfers) | Property tax | Sales tax | State aid | Debt service | Debt outstanding | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 (FYE 2019-07-31) | $17,360,576 | $19,002,842 | $13,844,552 | $15,331,159 | $9,015,911 | $2,694,285 | $1,638,022 | $1,811,114 | $20,964,846 | afr-2019 ⓘ · debt-2019 ⓘ OSC snapshot 2026-09-30 |
| 2020 (FYE 2020-07-31) | $17,015,589 | $17,458,905 | $13,504,995 | $13,806,601 | $8,845,455 | $2,747,687 | $1,449,384 | $1,446,900 | $21,757,127 | afr-2020 ⓘ · debt-2020 ⓘ OSC snapshot 2026-09-30 |
| 2021 (FYE 2021-07-31) | $18,033,560 | $17,760,465 | $14,167,648 | $13,970,269 | $8,996,719 | $3,041,954 | $1,487,320 | $1,483,730 | $20,606,618 | afr-2021 ⓘ · debt-2021 ⓘ OSC snapshot 2026-09-30 |
| 2022 (FYE 2022-07-31) | $18,813,484 | $18,933,196 | $14,897,321 | $15,065,873 | $8,836,361 | $3,387,000 | $1,756,966 | $1,466,669 | $19,444,474 | afr-2022 ⓘ · debt-2022 ⓘ OSC snapshot 2026-09-30 |
Operating and property-tax figures are our sums of OSC account-level data (independent calculation, not OSC's own totals); GF = general fund (A). No AFR data in OSC bulk files for 2023, 2024, 2025 (left blank, not estimated).
Tax cap filings (OSC)
| Fiscal year | Prior levy | Proposed levy | Levy limit | Limit minus proposed | Levy growth | Override planned |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | $6,298,931 | $0 | $6,558,693 | $6,558,693 | -100% | No |
| 2020 | $6,445,000 | $6,580,000 | $6,628,386 | $48,386 | 2.1% | No |
| 2021 | $6,580,000 | $6,686,685 | $6,686,685 | $0 | 1.6% | No |
| 2022 | $6,686,685 | $6,802,528 | $7,102,671 | $300,143 | 1.7% | No |
| 2023 | $6,802,528 | $6,938,578 | $6,872,254 | $-66,324 | 2% | Yes |
| 2024 | $6,938,578 | $7,493,664 | $7,167,324 | $-326,340 | 8% | Yes |
| 2025 | $7,493,664 | $7,872,842 | $7,305,866 | $-566,976 | 5.1% | Yes |
| 2026 | $7,872,842 | $7,872,844 | $8,085,187 | $212,343 | 0% | No |
| 2027 | $7,872,844 | $8,109,029 | $8,092,012 | $-17,017 | 3% | Yes |
Source: taxcap ⓘ, snapshot 10/09/2026. Highlighted rows: proposed levy above the computed limit. Filings are as submitted to OSC before budget adoption; a later fiscal year that has not been filed yet does not appear.
OSC Fiscal Stress Monitoring System
| FY | Stress designation | Fiscal score | Environmental rating | Env. score | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Not filed | – | – | – | fsms-muni-2019 ⓘ |
| 2020 | Not filed | – | – | – | fsms-muni-2020 ⓘ |
| 2021 | Not filed | – | – | – | fsms-muni-2021 ⓘ |
| 2022 | Not filed | – | – | – | fsms-muni-2022 ⓘ |
| 2023 | Not filed | – | – | – | fsms-muni-2023 ⓘ |
| 2024 | Not filed | – | – | – | fsms-muni-2024 ⓘ |
| 2025 | Not Filed | – | – | – | fsms-muni-2025 ⓘ |
Listed on OSC's FSMS 2025 not-filed (municipalities). Last filed in time for a score: 2013. fsms-notfiled-muni-2025 ⓘ
OSC audits (1)
- City of Rensselaer – Accounting Records and Reports (2023M-26) August 2, 2024 · Records and Reports
Source: osc-audits ⓘ. Matched by entity name in the report title.
In meetings
Context only. These links point to meetings where budget, levy, fund balance, debt or audits came up; they are not used in any figure above.
- 2026-10-07 · Board · COMMON COUNCIL MEETING AGENDA AND RESOLUTIONS 10-07-2026 agenda · budget terms on p. 3, 91, 111, 116 · adopted budget, budget amendment
- 2026-09-16 · Board · COMMON COUNCIL MEETING AGENDA AND RESOLUTIONS 9-16-2026 agenda · budget terms on p. 3, 6, 9, 12, 41, 42, 44, 48 · fund balance, independent auditor, adopted budget, tentative budget
- 2026-08-19 · Board · 08-19-2026 COMMON COUNCIL MEETING AGENDA AND RESOLUTIONS agenda · budget terms on p. 3, 17, 18, 20, 21 · bond resolution, bond anticipation, serial bonds, appropriated
Profile data as JSON: /api/entity/rensselaer-county/rensselaer.json