Amsterdam residents are reacting to news that came out of Wednesday night's budget meeting. As YNN's Maria Valvanis explains, while council members were able to bringing the preliminary budget's 55 percent tax increase down to a 46 percent increase, some residents still aren't pleased.

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AMSTERDAM, N.Y. -- Resident Rudy Suttle said, "They have to do better, because as a retiree, I don't get a raise."

Suttle is one of many Amsterdam residents suddenly finding himself short of cash. The city is currently working on a preliminary budget that features a hefty 46 percent tax increase.

"Raising taxes is not the answer, because people are moving," said Suttle.

"I am very, very upset," said resident Julia Torres.

And rightfully so, since residents unanimously voted to pass a three percent tax increase cap, which seems obsolete at this point.

"We have to come up with $2.1 million to come under that tax ceiling," said Councilmember Joseph Isabel.

"There's no way in the world they're going to come up with $2 million. They're not going to cut $2 million," said resident Jim Martuscello.

And at this point, it's unclear what exactly the budget will be cutting.

Isabel said, "The mayor's position on this is people want to pay for the services they have in the city, they don't want to see them cut. I think the biggest thing I've seen in the past few days is a number of emails saying don't take the tax cap off, keep the tax cap in place."

Councilmember Isabel tells us that he and his fellow council members are prepared to start going through the budget with a fine toothed comb.

"I think the initial thing is to go through all the funds and cut what needs to be cut and then after that, go through and see where we have to make some painful decisions," said Isabel.

Regardless of what those decisions may be, residents aren't convinced they will quite enough.

"Even if they drop it to, anything but even is too high for this community," said Martuscello.