FAITH — The Faith Board of Aldermen approved a budget on Wednesday that holds the tax rate steady as well as keeping many of the departments’ budgets near the current year’s.

The proposed budget was approved without any changes during the special meeting, said Mayor Randall Barger, and kept the property tax rate at $0.41 per $100 of valuation but did increase the town’s monthly trash fee by $1 and the sewer fee by $1.

Both of those proposed changes were due to increases in the cost for the town’s contracts for each service. Town Clerk Karen Fink said when the budget was proposed that the trash change was caused by the “high cost of the contract, which is (the same) across the state” and Barger said that the town was losing money at its current rate.

Alderman Jayne Lingle said previously that the increase in the sewer rate was to keep up with Salisbury-Rowan Utilities’ own rate increase.

“Their increase, which came to $2.61 between water and sewer, we’re still going to be way behind when we have to deal with them with sewer. We’ll catch up eventually, we just didn’t want people to have sticker shock when the (rates increase),” said Lingle.

The total budget stands at approximately $880,000, up from the prior year’s budgeted $855,833. Much of the approximately $25,000 increase comes from the contract with Granite Quarry for the joint police department, up $20,000 from the prior year to approximately $195,000.

The fire department’s budget also increased by approximately $10,000, which almost entirely comes from an increase in payroll and call reimbursement. The recreation budget was decreased to by approximately $17,000, reflecting a decrease in town contributions to events.

Approval of the Faith budget was delayed due to uncertainty surrounding the town’s police coverage, as the aldermen had voted to end the contract with Granite Quarry for police coverage and explored contracting with the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office. However, negotiations between Granite Quarry and Faith ended in an agreement between the two towns to extend the contract for another year. The fiscal year starts on July 1, meaning towns need to have the budget approved before then.