Gwen,
The process for resubmitting a budget would be within your governing documents. It would be the same as initially submitting a budget.
From
an article on budgets:
An HOA operating budget is a projection of the money needed by the association to cover its operating expenses and provide adequate reserves for repair and replacement of the elements of the property the HOA maintains. In practice, this means the HOA revises its budget from the previous year to take into account changes in its financial position and cost structure. The governing documents describe the manner in which the HOA budget is adopted each year. Therefore, if the budget is presented properly (showing where the increases are and why), I think it would be unusual for a membership to reject it. To help illustrate this, I've attached one file that was provided at a board meeting to decide what we will present to the membership (shows 2013 and 2014). The other file is what we presented to the membership at the annual meeting (shows only 2014). Typically, the only time that a budget becomes questionable is when there is a huge increase in assessments (like when initially trying to properly fund the Reserves).
What I am talking about in regards to the flexibility is not in any document I am aware of. Budgets are typically guidelines. They are goals you try to meet. Actual Expenses rarely meet the amount budgeted to the penny.
For example, we set a budget line item this year for our Trash/Recycle service based on the contract costs. However, the county landfill increased fees in July. This resulted in contractor passing those costs onto us (as was authorized in the contract). Technically, because of this increase in expenses, we are over budget for that line item. However, in order to meet that additional expense (which we had no control over) we reallocated funds from a different line item to the trash/recycling contract line item. This is simply how budgets work.
Several years ago we created a line item called miscellaneous in the budget. It's money budgeted to cover unexpected minor repairs and to cover underfunded line items (like my trash/recycle example earlier). Basically, it's a cushion the Board has built into the budget to protect the Association from uncontrolled expenses.
Even if you don't have a line item for miscellaneous, there is typically some line item that is budgeted for that you know the actual expenses will be less then what was budgeted. Examples:
Legal Fees, we always budget for legal fees but normally don't come near spending the amount budgeted.
Snow Removal, if the year has a light snowfall, we will typically have money unspent from this line item.
Tree Maintenance, we budget every year for tree pruning. However, the Board makes the decision when to spend from that line item. Therefore, if needed, we can simply not prune a tree or two.
Hope this helps,
Tim