The Tusculum Board of Mayor and Commissioners on Monday night approved a budget for the 2009-10 fiscal year and re-elected the municipality's mayor and vice-mayor.

The 2009-10 fiscal year budget, Mayor John Foster told the board, projects $738,500 in revenue and an equal amount in expenditures.

Foster noted that $300,000 of the projected revenue and expenditures is in the form of a state grant that will be used to purchase a new fire truck for the Tusculum Volunteer Fire Department.

Absent that grant, the mayor said, Tusculum's 2009-10 revenues and expenditures would total only $438,500 for all local government operations.

Late in the Monday night meeting, Foster was re-elected Tusculum's mayor for a two-year term by his fellow commissioners. Alan Corley was elected vice-mayor.

Under Tusculum's city commission form of government, three commissioners are elected to staggered four-year terms. After each municipal election, the three commissioners choose a mayor and a vice-mayor from among their number to serve two-year terms.

Foster had been re-elected by the voters as one of Tusculum's three commissioners during the June 2 municipal election. He is joined on the Tusculum Board of Mayor and Commissioners Corley and Mark Easterly.

In addition to approving, on second, and final, reading, the municipal budget for the 2008-09 fiscal year, the board also approved routine amendments to the budget for the current fiscal year.

Mayor Foster told the board that the Tusculum government should end 2008-08 fiscal year on June 30 with a net gain in the municipality's fund balance of $20,338.

He noted that projections are that Tusculum's revenues for the 2008-08 fiscal year were $9,000 greater than had been budgeted, while expenditures for the 2008-09 fiscal year are expected to total $11,338 less than had been budgeted.

Revenue from most sources declined during the 2008-09 fiscal year, Foster said, with investment income showing the greatest decline at 37-percent from the 2007-08 fiscal year total.

In other action, Mayor Foster told the board that one of Tusculum's two police patrol cars is experiencing problems with its transmission.

Police Chief Danny Greene is exploring the cost of options.

Foster also told the board that due to a new state law Tusculum must hire a certified municipal clerk by 2013.

Foster said the new requirement will be very costly for small municipalities such as Tusculum and that he had had preliminary discussions with several other municipalities about the possibility of several local governments sharing one certified municipal clerk.

Foster said Baileyton, Mosheim, Tusculum, Bulls Gap and Surgoinsville could possibly share a certified municipal clerk, splitting salary and benefit costs.

The Tusculum Board heard monthly activity reports from representatives of the Tusculum Police Department and Tusculum Volunteer Fire Department.

Police Chief Danny Greene told the board that during May, Tusculum officers issued 29 citations, filed eight reports and made seven arrests.

Commissioner Corley, who also is chief of the Tusculum Volunteer Fire Department, told the board that during May, his department responded to 25 calls.

Among the calls, he said, were 14 motor-vehicle accidents, two structure fires and seven other calls.

Only six of the incidents to which Tusculum VFD firefighters responded in May were at locations within the Tusculum corporate limits, Corley said.