\n Sandwell Council said it will make more than \u00a38m worth of cuts and savings as well as tap into just over \u00a39m from its reserves to cover the shortfall in its finances for 2026\/27.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\n The proposed 4.99% increase in council tax would see the average band D bill rise by \u00a391 from April next year to cover Sandwell Council\u2019s services and is likely to rise even higher once the precepts for the region\u2019s fire service and police as well as the West Midlands Combined Authority set their precepts.\n<\/p>\n
\n Band A and band B \u2013 which covers around three quarters of Sandwell households \u2013 would rise by around \u00a360 and \u00a370 respectively for the council\u2019s services alone.\n<\/p>\n
\n The cost of green waste collections would increase in 2027, the budget proposals said. Other council fees and charges are set to rise but are yet to be confirmed.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\n The council tax increase is predicted to bring in an extra \u00a37m and the increased fee for garden waste collections an extra \u00a3200,000.\n<\/p>\n
\n The council\u2019s medium term financial plan also reveals the expected budget deficits for the next five years including \u00a326m in 2027\/28 rising to nearly \u00a338m a year later, \u00a343m in 2029\/30 before finally reaching \u00a348m by 2030\/31.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\n Cuts and savings between \u00a38 and \u00a310 million would also have to be made each year until 2031 but would only chip away at the huge gaps.\n<\/p>\n
\n The council has also revealed dozens of cuts and proposals to save or make money to help balance next year\u2019s budget.\n<\/p>\n
\n Five vacant positions for school crossing patrols would be scrapped and replaced with permanent zebra crossings to save money.\n<\/p>\n
\n In September, the council introduced fortnightly bin collections which would see general waste and recycling collected on alternative weeks instead of weekly.\n<\/p>\n
\n The move would see the council begin to see full-year savings, it said, with \u00a31.3m expected to be saved next year.\n<\/p>\n
\n Sandwell Childen\u2019s Trust, the company set up to run children\u2019s services on the council\u2019s behalf,\u00a0 is also \u00a320m in the red according to the budget proposals which will see Sandwell Council upping the price of the three-year contract it awards to the trust using council reserves to cover the deficit.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\n Huge rises in the cost of adult social care are predicted each year with an extra \u00a3140m expected to have been spent by 2031.\n<\/p>\n
\n Inflation, population growth and demographic changes as well as historic adjustments are predicted to have cost an extra \u00a3355m on top of the entire council budget.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sandwell Council said it will make more than \u00a38m worth of cuts and savings as well as tap…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":563809,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7820],"tags":[855,748,393,4884,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-563808","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-birmingham","8":"tag-birmingham","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115531713430796521","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=563808"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563808\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/563809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=563808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=563808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=563808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}