After a month of number crunching by Town of Tonawanda officials, the projected property tax increase in the 2010 budget has been cut roughly in half.

The tax bill for an average home assessed at $50,000 will be $1,160.91, a year-to- year increase of $17.12. Under the tentative budget released last month by Supervisor Anthony F. Caruana, the increase would have been $33.67.

“This represents an increase of 1.5 percent rather than the 2.9 percent proposed in the tentative budget,” Caruana notes in his preliminary budget message. “It is important to note that the 1.5 percent increase is the lowest increase since 2002.”

A public hearing on the preliminary budget is scheduled for 7:30 p. m. Thursday in Council Chambers at the Municipal Building, 2919 Delaware Ave., Kenmore.

Spending is up approximately $2.68 million in the $88.54 million preliminary budget. Higher hospital and medical insurance costs account for $1.9 million of that, according to Caruana. The tax levy is approximately $46.4 million, up from roughly $45.14 million in the current budget. A small increase in assessed valuation townwide was the result of new building activity, the supervisor said.

The annual budget process begins in June, when the supervisor — who is also the chief fiscal and budget officer—sends guidelines to department heads. This year, they were told there should be no increase in operating budgets other than personnel services.

The tentative budget presented by the supervisor last month was based on departmental requests that were tweaked in meetings with the supervisor and comptroller. Then, two budget work sessions between the Town Board and department heads yielded several changes. The Town Board voted unanimously in favor of the following reductions:

$30,000 from utility appropriations for Youth, Parks & Recreation Department facilities.

$75,000 from the Highway Department, mostly from supply accounts.

A total of $200,000 from seven accounts related to hospital and medical insurance.

$75,000 from the equipment/other account for the sewer treatment plant.