The 2022/2023 budget has been approved. Below are some highlights.
City council set the tax rate as high as possible without triggering an election ($0.3156).
Total debt obligations are $1.4 million – up from $660,000 just five years ago.
They will raise 9.37% MORE from taxes on existing properties this year. Hey, someone has to pay for Assistant to the City Manager Ryan Ward’s COLAs and regular raises and benefit increases and all that other stuff in appreciation for his 9 long months of service.
Hey wait….didn’t the City government get showered with almost $2,000,000 in Covid money AND huge sales tax increases thanks to inflation and reckless federal stimulus? Yes. Yes they did. Now shut up and give them 9.37% more, you chump.
The IT department will see a 14.7% increase!Going from $353,690 up to $407,120. Of that, $222,500 (55%) is for salaries and benefits.
This is also a 42% increase over the budget five years ago…or over 8% annual increases.
Another $14,000 is for “professional services”. That means companies like TSM Consulting who come in and do anything more complicated than backing up data or changing printer cartridges.
Interesting side note: the “professional services” line item used to be50% higher– around $21,600 – roughly 5 years ago. Suspiciously, it started decreasing not long after I publicly shamed them over and over four years ago about hiring a third-party to do their work for them. Now, am I saying I’m a hero for exposing the waste and thus saving the taxpayer tens of thousands of dollars when City council finally started asking questions? No. But you can feel free to say it if you like.
Economic Director will see a 8.6% salary increasefrom $77,769 up to $84,423. Salary PLUS benefits will go from $107,053 to $115,879 (up 8.2%).
Police Department sees a whopping 26% increase! This is from $2.866 million to $3.616 million. Cost increase over the last five years is 47% – or almost 10% per annum ($2.46 million to $3.61 million).
I’m guessing a lot of this is due to the idiotic notion that we need cops in every school with $85,000 cars parked out front to “deter” lunatics. I said it would have been cheaper to arm some teachers. The more expensive path always prevails in government.
Fire Department beats them ALL with a 37% increase! Wow. The went from $1.9 million to $2.6 million in one year. Over the last five years, it has DOUBLED from $1.3 million to $2.6 million. Five years. Doubled. Ouch.
I’m pretty sure they are getting a new fire truck over there too – which I THINK was either fully or partially paid for with federal “covid” recovery funds. So that was something like $800k they didn’t have to spend out of their own budget. Yet they STILL went up 37%! Makes you wonder where it all goes.
Streets – well there is ONE area the City government is being stingy with: the STREETS category. They will spend $169,000 less on them.It goes from $1.58 million down to $1.42 million – a 10% DECREASE.
It’s not like streets are a priority. Ryan Ward (assistant to the City manager) has already told us that “our employees are our number one priority“. Remember? I do. He said it right HERE. Streets cannot be a priority when jacking up $100,000 salaries is the actual priority, fool.
Total expenditures for the operating budget go from $12 million last year to $13.68 million this coming year –an increase of 14%