Smokers who shop for cigarettes in Vinton will be paying 20 cents more a pack come Aug. 1 when the town implements its first tax on the tobacco product.

The Vinton Town Council approved the tax Tuesday at a rate one-third lower than the 30-cents-a-pack proposal that town merchants protested last month.

While the merchants group didn't persuade the council to keep the tax down to 5 cents, it did convince some that the volume of sales was much higher than normal in Vinton because of neighboring Roanoke's much higher 54-cents-a-pack tax.

Council members decided that even if sales approached only 1.5 million packs a year -- half of what the merchants group estimated -- it still would raise at least the $258,000 that had been projected from a cigarette tax and meals tax increase combined.

Consequently, they declined to vote on a proposal to raise the meals tax from 5 percent to 6 percent. That would have raised about $140,000 a year.

Town Manager Chris Lawrence said his earlier estimate that a 30-cent cigarette tax would raise $115,000 in revenue was based on comparisons with towns of similar size in the state.

While he recommended going to the 20-cent rate, he warned the council that sales figures are all estimates until the town begins collecting the tax.

Council members Billy Obenchain and Wes Nance both made a point to note that the town would be keeping its options open as the year progressed and that if revenues did not meet projections, increases in both the cigarette and meals taxes could be imposed later.

Only Councilman Bobby Altice voted against the cigarette tax and the overall $10.8 million budget, contending that both are inadequate and that he believes the town will have to both cut the budget and increase the tax as the year proceeds.

The new spending plan is 3 percent lower than the current year's budget.

The budget holds the town's real estate tax rate steady at 3 cents per $100 valuation -- although residents also pay real estate taxes of $1.09 per $100 to Roanoke County.

The general fund, providing for basic services such as police, fire and rescue, street maintenance and garbage collection, amounts to $7.7 million. The utility fund, paying for water and sewer services, is $3 million, and $94,000 is set aside for capital improvements.

On Tuesday, the council also increased water and sewer fees 10 percent across the board.

For an average family using 13,275 gallons a month, that will amount to an increase of about $4.13 a month, Lawrence said.

Current rates are not even keeping even with costs, he said, much less providing some set-aside funds for future capital improvements to an aging water system.

Public Works Manager Mike Kennedy told council members that the town would need to invest about $35 million over the next 25 years to upgrade the system.

A major review of rates and funding for those future improvements is scheduled to begin this fall, Lawrence said.

In other action, the board found a new home for the skateboard ramps it dismantled after closing the town's skateboard park last fall.

The ramps, which have been in storage since September, will go to Renewanation, a Roanoke-based nonprofit organization that plans to install them at a site on Orange Avenue near Vinton, Assistant Town Manager Consuella Caudill said.

Although attempts to find a new location for the ramps in the town were unsuccessful, Caudill said the new location will be convenient for town residents.