NORTH HAVERHILL — The Grafton County delegation is scheduled to vote Monday on a proposed $57.6 million budget for the fiscal year beginning July 1.

Though the proposed budget carries an increase in spending of just 2.4%, it is expected to result in a nearly 11.5% increase in the amount to be raised by taxes.

The bulk of the tax increase is the result of a significant reduction in the use of surplus funds to offset taxes, County Administrator Julie Libby said.

For the current fiscal year, the delegation approved adding $2.48 million in revenue from fund balance.

The commissioners initially proposed cutting that to $2.25 million for the upcoming fiscal year in their proposed budget. But earlier this week, in its final meeting, the delegation’s executive committee cut the fund balance line item to $1.7 million, Libby said.

“Over the past several years, decisions have been made to use a higher surplus in order to have no increase or slight decreases in the amount to be raised by taxes,” the three county commissioners said in their May 9 letter presenting the budget to the delegation and others. “While that worked well in those years, it has set the stage for what we are now experiencing.”

The reduction in fund balance the last two years has coincided with expenses exceeding revenues, which results in the amount to be raised by taxes next year at $30.4 million, or $3 million more than the current year, the commissioners said.

In addition, the county directed $5 million of surplus for the Broadband Middle Mile project, which aims to construct 200 miles of fiber cable, connecting 24 municipal town halls in the county.

The executive committee trimmed the commissioners’ budget proposal by about $62,000, bringing the dollar increase in the budget to about $1.3 million.

A 2% salary increase for county employees not covered under collective bargaining agreements and a 6.8% increase in health insurance rates account for the overall increase, with the rest of the county’s expenses level-funded from the current year, the commissioners said in their May 9 letter.

Staffing levels have recovered in the last year and a half as the county works to recruit and retain employees, but requests from several departments to add staff were denied due to the shortfall in fund balance, the commissioners said.

On the revenue side, non-tax revenues are projected to increase nearly 6% in the coming year with most departments budgeting higher revenues, the commissioners said.

The largest increase, $1.4 million, is in nursing home revenues because with staffing levels back up, more residents can be accepted.

“We are currently at the highest census levels we have been at in years,” the commissioners said. The nursing home census is anticipated at 124 for the 135-bed facility.

The Department of Revenue Administration will set the actual tax rate for each community based on an equalization formula and property assessments in each municipality, Libby said.

The delegation of state representatives will vote on the budget at the delegation convention on Monday beginning at 9 a.m. in the UNH extension room at the county complex on Dartmouth Highway in North Haverhill.

Patrick O’Grady can be reached at pogclmt@gmail.com.