Twombly said how that funding is paid — whether it’s from the tax itself or from the city’s general fund — is a policy decision for elected officials.

Paying for it out of the tax proceeds would mean less money to hire police officers and firefighters. But finding the money in the city’s general fund would mean more burden on already restricted funding for other departments — a burden that the public-safety tax was designed to alleviate.

Councilor Karen Gilbert, who led the task force that molded the tax package, said there’s no room in the package to include support costs for other departments.

“That wasn’t taken into account when we put the proposal together,” Gilbert said. “Our focus was to add more police officers.”

She said the notion of support costs was discussed but that detailed estimates of almost $2 million were not determined until recently.

Gilbert said she thinks the estimates are likely high and that city officials should wait until the tax project is being implemented to see what the exact costs are to other departments.