BonnerSprings.com

The Edwardsville City Council got its first look at the 2011 budget, and the report wasn’t all bad news.

After battling a serious budget crisis for the 2010 budget, the city seems to have maintained a balance from the actions it took the previous year. While the presentation provided by City Administrator Webb didn’t get into specific nickels and dimes, the overview gave council members a quick look at what they can expect out of upcoming meetings.

“I think we’re in better shape than most,” Webb said. “I think we’re at least stable now.”

Keeping stable comes as a great relief to a council that had tough decisions to make when passing the 2010 budget, including layoffs, the increase of the sewer rate, and the suspension of funding for the cemetery board.

Webb said in his report the city had yet to receive property valuations from the county, but expected those within the week. Once those are in, he said, the city will have a better idea where it stands.

Webb said he expected valuations to come in right in line with last year.

“Right now I’m anticipating a flat value. Maybe a little better off because we had some new development come on line” Webb said, reiterating the most likely scenario is a no flux in property valuations.

The same goes for sales tax, Webb said, of maintaining a flat value. Webb said he would guess either a 2 to 3 percent changes either positive or negative when it comes to sales tax.

“Locally the sales tax has stayed level,” Webb said. “But the Legends took a cut so the county sales tax took a hit. It kind of depends on what happens in the last six months.”

Council member Mark Bishop said he’d like the council to address the topic of having another half-cent sales tax increase election. He said he thought the first attempt, in 2009, failed because the increase wasn’t earmarked for a specific use. He said if the issue comes up again, he’d like to designate the increased revenue go toward the police and fire departments.

“I think this time around, if we’re going to move toward independence from KCK,” Bishop said referring to the fire departments dependence on Kansas City, Kan., for emergency medical assistance, “we go to the general public and say, ‘This is what we’re doing.’ People understand that we depend on them over there, and eventually we have to get away from that because it’s going to start costing us a lot more.”

Edwardsville is currently in negotiations with Kansas City, Kan., in regard to its EMS assistance contract. Kansas City, Kan., has requested an increase in its fee because the amount now is not fairly covering the service it provides.

Webb said talk about starting the process of the city forming its own EMS system has been a hot topic lately, but it would be in the future due to the cost involved. He said the city needed to start considering ways to finance the project, either through the sales tax election or setting aside money in the budget, if the council wanted to move forward.

He also said he’d had several discussions with police chief and interim fire chief Mark Mathies about the need to hire an assistant chief. He said one of the discussion topics he plans to bring up in future meetings about the 2011 budget is if the city should use the salary left over from the retirement of former fire chief Cliff Lane to hire one or two assistant chiefs.

“For that last couple of years, everything was what we can do to survive mode,” Webb said. “But I think we can start looking in the future, and in 2011 not be struggling to survive but looking to where we want to be.”

The next budget discussions will take place during a work session Monday, July 12. A time as yet to be set.

In other business, the council:

• Approved, 5-0, minutes from the June 14 meeting.

• Approved, 5-0, payment of bills totaling $179,979.46.

• Approved, 5-0, a final plat of the Woodend Road Industrial Park, which took the four existing lots and combined two to create only three lots.

• Approved, 5-0, a special use permit for JHF Dirtworks, LLC, to run a business out of a residential home at 10435 Riverview Avenue.

Comments

1. 

   hmm (anonymous) says…

   I notice that yet again Mathies is in the mix of things. I for one am getting tired of Mathies and his way of doing things. Maybe instead of two part time asst. cheifs, one full time cheif would be good and let Mathies go back to trying to run the police department.

   July 14, 2010 at 11:53 a.m.

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