2026 Proposed Budget Presentation

At the City Commission meeting tonight, I will make a presentation outlining the proposed 2026 Budget for the City of Atchison. The public hearing for the Revenue Neutral Rate and 2026 Budget will then be held on September 8th at 4:30 pm at City Hall.

Here is a link to the slides that I will be presenting tonight: https://cityofatchison.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/2026-budget-presentation.pdf

The goal of the City Commission, myself, and City staff when crafting this budget was to reasonably meet increasing costs and wages without creating a large property tax increase for our share of that calculation. We believe we were able to do that. The proposed budget would result in a 2.5% increase in property tax revenue, which falls below the current CPI inflation calculation for 2025 (2.7%). The 6-year average for the City of Atchison (back to 2020) would be 2.2% per year vs. the CPI average of 4.1% per year over the same span.

Thank you for your dedication to our City,

Mark Westhoff
City Manager