How Can Taxes Go Up If Spending Goes Down?

I posted some comments on the 'Ken Gray for Amesbury Mayor' Facebook page recently. Evidently, they were all removed on the morning of the Preliminary Election. Mr. Gray can do what he wants with his campaign page, that's fine, but I find myself perplexed and put off by this. Here is my best recollection/recreation of my last deleted post. I was responding to a comment from a Gray supporter (Dave Haraske, my opponent in District 6), who was asking how, if we see new revenues from projects like the Upper Millyard renovation, the residential tax rate has still gone up and was also asserting that Mayor Kezer has done nothing to control spending. Here it is:

"As you know, Dave, from the data that we looked at when we were both on the 2010 Ad-Hoc Citizen's Committee, Amesbury was the only community out of the 13 comparison communities that we looked at that had *negative* budget growth between the years 2008 and 2010. And yet, in those same years and even as our operating budget decreased, our tax rate and average residential property tax bill went up. How could that possibly be? Simple. The operating budget has a stew of revenues, including property tax. During those same years and following the global market crash, we saw reductions in Local Aid and excise tax receipts (as folks held off on buying new cars or a boat, etc). So, even as our spending decreased, our property tax increased, in order to maintain the level of services that we want as a town. And looking at 2008 - 2012, the operating budget only increased by 4.1% over 5 years, or 0.8% a year. US inflation across those same years was 6.6%, so in real dollars, our budget grew slower than inflation, even as inflation drove up our operating costs, such as health care benefits, increased cost of goods, etc. At the same time, between 2010 and 2013, the portion of our budget that goes to schools increased from 49% to 55%. Our bond rating has gone up two notches (thus lowering our interest costs on capital debt service). Our reserves have increased from next to nothing to over a million dollars. And we have retained a gap under our Prop 2 1/2 levy limit that gives us future budgetary flexibility without resorting to an over-ride. That sounds like good fiscal management and good priorities to me."