New London — A group of residents filed petitions with the city clerk on Wednesday in an attempt to force the City Council to reconsider the 2017-18 budget, or send it to a referendum vote.

"The taxes have gone up and up and up, and people can't afford them," said Karen Paul, a city resident and member of the petitioning committee. 

The City Council voted last month to approve an overall $90.05 million budget for next year, which comprises $41.7 million for education and $48.3 million for city government. Under the spending plan, the tax rate would increase from 40.46 mills to 44.26 mills next year.

The petitioning committee said Wednesday that it collected 603 signatures for the Board of Education budget petition and 640 signatures for the city budget petition.

City Clerk Jonathan Ayala said that, under city charter, a successful petition would have 10 percent of the number of people that voted in the last municipal election, or about 340 certified signatures. Within 10 days, he will verify if there is a sufficient number of signatures. 

If the petitions have the required number of signatures, the city clerk then would send a memo to the circulators notifying them that the petitions are certified to be sufficient.

The clerk then would submit the petitions to be on the next City Council agenda. According to city charter, the City Council could either repeal the budget and adopt a revised budget, or move it to a referendum vote at the next municipal election in November. The charter also provides that the City Council could opt, with five votes, to schedule a special election not sooner than 30 days after its vote.

If the petitions don't have enough signatures, the city clerk would notify the circulators, who then would have 10 days to amend the petition, according to the charter. The city clerk then would have five days to inspect the amendments.

Dan McSparran, a community member who is on the petitioning committee, said he has conducted more than a dozen budget referendum petitions, but this time, people actually were reaching out to him — with emails, phone calls and Facebook messages.

"It was an overwhelming response," McSparran said in a phone interview. He said the education and city budgets are too high, and taxpayers can't afford this "unsustainable level" of tax increases.

"Too many people are literally fleeing the city, because they just can't pay the taxes," said Marie Friess-McSparran, who, along with Paul, dropped off the petitions on Wednesday.

Friess-McSparran, a former City Council member, added that some people who are remaining in the city can't afford to pay their medical expenses because of the taxes. 

Day Staff Writer Greg Smith contributed to this report.

k.drelich@theday.com