Fredonia’s tax hike is now 65.3% – and Village Board members are finding themselves between a rock and a hard place.

During a meeting this week, board members looked at nickel and dime cuts – cutting board members’ pay, talking about eliminating the mayor’s cell phone plan from the village budget, cutting a police car purchase and looking at the village’s phone service through DFT.

All told, the tax increase has gone up from what was originally proposed by Mayor Mike Ferguson.

If board members find themselves stuck, just think about taxpayers who are looking at not only a tax hike but an increase in their water and sewer rates, too. We couldn’t agree more with Trustee Jon Esperson, who said the village must get more serious about either sharing services or eliminating services.

“This tells the tale,” he said, holding up the budget. “These numbers say we have to make dramatic changes. Nothing can strike home more than the tax increase we’re looking at.”

Of course, we agree with what Esperson is saying. But we also know such moves won’t happen quickly enough to pass a village budget that doesn’t cause a lot of pain for taxpayers in the short term. The budgetary handwriting has been on the wall for Fredonia for quite some time. We’ve all seen it. But evidently the handwriting was in Sanskrit, because even though we could see the handwriting no one was able to read it.

Buckle up, Fredonia residents, this is going to hurt.