City Manager James L. Sullivan yesterday submitted a budget that would freeze the addition of new positions to the city payroll and the promotion of existing employees to stay within the state 4-per-cent tax cap.

The budget, which does not include figures from the school department or final state aid figures, will represent an increase of about 3 per cent over last year's budget.

No raises for salaried employees, who must negotiate contracts with the city this summer, were included with the budget. Combined with a projected 13-per-cent increase in the school budget, those raises will push the final city budget over Gov. Edward J. King's tax cap, Assistant City Manager Robert Healy predicted last night.

Six city councilors will have to vote to override the tax cap.

Sullivan and Cambridge Mayor Francis H. Duehay '55 have already predicted an increase as large as $30 to $50 on the city's tax rate for next year.

Sullivan ordered city department heads to hold budget requests to two per cent above this year's levels, Healy said. Twelve public works employees were eliminated from the present work force in the budget, but no other major cuts in personnel were made, Healy said.

Increases in street lighting costs and interest rates made it hard to hold down spending, Healy added.

Sullivan, in his preamble to the budget, said, "It is virtually impossible to maintain the level of municipal services and stay within the 4-per-cent cap."

The city council finance committee will begin deliberations on the budget later this month.