Civic Finance

Budgets, levies, debt, fund balance and fiscal-stress data for local governments and school districts, straight from state filings.

Capital Region › Towns › Overlapping entities

Town of Waterford

Town · Saratoga County · Capital Region · OSC municipal code 410387500000

Population 8,032 (Census estimate 2025; 2020 base 8,205) popest-2025 ⓘ · Meeting coverage: documents

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Recurring deficits our calculation

General fund spending (incl. transfers out) exceeded revenues (incl. transfers in) in 2022, 2023, and operating funds overall spent more than they took in in 2022, 2023 (last 3 AFR years). Planned use of fund balance can cause this; check the adopted budgets.

Source: afr-2022 ⓘ · afr-2023 ⓘ

Levy above tax cap

OSC tax cap filings: proposed levy exceeded the computed levy limit for FY 2025 (by $120,531, override planned). Exceeding the limit requires a local law override (60% of the governing body).

Source: taxcap ⓘ

AFR not filed in time for FSMS score

Listed on OSC's FSMS 2025 not-filed (municipalities); last filed in time for a score: 2023. This is filing status, not a stress designation.

Source: fsms-notfiled-muni-2025 ⓘ

Compared with Capital Region towns

IndicatorTown of WaterfordPeer medianPercentilePeersBasis
Operating spending per capita$1,079$91364th101AFR 2023, operating funds (our calc)
Property tax per capita$414$40951st101AFR 2023 real property taxes (our calc)
Debt per capita$1,144$31688th73AFR 2023 debt detail, year-end outstanding
Debt service % of operating spending11%2.4%94th101AFR 2023 (our calc)
State aid % of operating revenue3.4%12.6%4th101AFR 2023 (our calc)
Sales tax % of operating revenue28.7%22.6%59th101AFR 2023 (our calc)
Fund balance ratio (OSC FSMS)28%48.1%26th96OSC FSMS FY2023
Operating spending growth over 5 AFR years11.7%26.7%16th100AFR 2019–2023 (our calc)
Levy growth6.3%13.2%20th1012021–2026 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

Operating funds: revenue vs. spending RevenueSpending
$0k$2.2M$4.3M$6.5M$8.7M20192020202120222023Revenue 2019: $7.6MRevenue 2020: $8.0MRevenue 2021: $7.4MRevenue 2022: $8.1MRevenue 2023: $8.1MSpending 2019: $7.8MSpending 2020: $8.2MSpending 2021: $7.1MSpending 2022: $8.3MSpending 2023: $8.7M

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.

General fund surplus / deficit General fund result (incl. transfers)
$-345k$-81k$183k$447k$711k20192020202120222023General fund result (incl. transfers) 2019: $95kGeneral fund result (incl. transfers) 2020: $-35kGeneral fund result (incl. transfers) 2021: $711kGeneral fund result (incl. transfers) 2022: $-49kGeneral fund result (incl. transfers) 2023: $-345k

OSC AFR, fund A, revenues and other sources minus expenditures and other uses (our calculation). Planned use of fund balance appears as a deficit.

Debt Debt outstandingDebt service
$0k$2.5M$5.1M$7.6M$10.1M20192020202120222023Debt outstanding 2019: $9.6MDebt outstanding 2020: $10.1MDebt outstanding 2021: $10.1MDebt outstanding 2022: $9.5MDebt outstanding 2023: $9.2MDebt service 2019: $935kDebt service 2020: $929kDebt service 2021: $895kDebt service 2022: $965kDebt service 2023: $950k

Year-end debt outstanding (OSC AFR debt detail) and debt service expenditures (OSC AFR).

Property tax levy (OSC tax tables) Total levy
$0k$886k$1.8M$2.7M$3.5M202120222023202420252026Total levy 2021: $3.3MTotal levy 2022: $3.3MTotal levy 2023: $3.2MTotal levy 2024: $3.2MTotal levy 2025: $3.5MTotal levy 2026: $3.5M

Levy as reported in OSC's annual tax tables for the year shown.

OSC FSMS fund balance ratio
FY202328.0%

Assigned + unassigned general fund balance ÷ gross expenditures, as computed by OSC.

OSC FSMS fiscal stress score (higher = more stress)
FY20195 No DesignationFY20205 No DesignationFY20215 No DesignationFY20225 No DesignationFY20235 No DesignationFY20240 Not filedFY20250 Not Filed

OSC's own scores and designations. 'Not filed' rows mean the AFR was not filed in time to be scored.

Annual Financial Report series

YearOperating revenueOperating spendingGF revenue (incl. transfers)GF spending (incl. transfers)Property taxSales taxState aidDebt serviceDebt outstandingSource
2019 (FYE 2019-12-31)$7,637,477$7,756,733$3,009,072$2,914,465$3,634,054$2,208,178$130,393$934,560$9,610,582afr-2019 ⓘ · debt-2019 ⓘ
OSC snapshot 2026-09-30
2020 (FYE 2020-12-31)$8,028,595$8,163,461$3,653,371$3,688,327$3,723,914$2,015,137$864,797$928,786$10,118,070afr-2020 ⓘ · debt-2020 ⓘ
OSC snapshot 2026-09-30
2021 (FYE 2021-12-31)$7,419,167$7,067,180$3,507,002$2,796,068$3,454,692$2,080,078$240,170$894,528$10,139,553afr-2021 ⓘ · debt-2021 ⓘ
OSC snapshot 2026-09-30
2022 (FYE 2022-12-31)$8,131,752$8,324,403$2,889,767$2,938,548$3,451,875$2,207,635$375,017$964,806$9,515,250afr-2022 ⓘ · debt-2022 ⓘ
OSC snapshot 2026-09-30
2023 (FYE 2023-12-31)$8,117,885$8,665,552$2,857,330$3,202,475$3,325,391$2,329,650$276,983$950,360$9,184,967afr-2023 ⓘ · debt-2023 ⓘ
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 2024, 2025 (left blank, not estimated).

Tax cap filings (OSC)

Fiscal yearPrior levyProposed levyLevy limitLimit minus proposedLevy growthOverride planned
2019$3,601,536$3,517,723$3,695,452$177,729-2.3%No
2020$3,517,723$3,608,094$3,654,212$46,1182.6%No
2021$3,608,094$3,332,305$3,725,356$393,051-7.6%No
2022$3,332,305$3,315,094$3,455,274$140,180-0.5%No
2023$3,315,094$3,186,702$3,443,041$256,339-3.9%No
2024$3,186,702$3,277,926$3,320,607$42,6812.9%No
2025$3,277,926$3,501,954$3,381,423$-120,5316.8%Yes
2026$3,501,954$3,583,868$3,583,869$12.3%No

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

FYStress designationFiscal scoreEnvironmental ratingEnv. scoreSource
2019No Designation5No Designation20fsms-muni-2019 ⓘ
2020No Designation5No Designation6.7fsms-muni-2020 ⓘ
2021No Designation5No Designation3.3fsms-muni-2021 ⓘ
2022No Designation5No Designation6.7fsms-muni-2022 ⓘ
2023No Designation5No Designation6.7fsms-muni-2023 ⓘ
2024Not filed–––fsms-muni-2024 ⓘ
2025Not Filed–––fsms-muni-2025 ⓘ

FSMS fund balance (Indicator 1): FY2023 28% ($895,719 of $3,198,338) fsms-ind1-muni-2023 ⓘ

Filing status

Listed on OSC's FSMS 2025 not-filed (municipalities). Last filed in time for a score: 2023. fsms-notfiled-muni-2025 ⓘ

OSC audits (2)

Source: osc-audits ⓘ. Matched by entity name in the report title.

Profile data as JSON: /api/entity/saratoga-county/waterford.json