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Council members disagree on budget components
By Chris Roark, roarkc@acnpapers.com
‘Tis budget season, but not everyone was so jolly Thursday.
The Flower Mound Town Council hosted a public hearing for residents to voice their opinions on the town's 2009-10 budget. But in a meeting in which only a handful of residents attended, it was the council members themselves who made the biggest fuss on which direction to go on a variety of topics.
The council examined the budget to direct the town staff on how to prepare the final budget that will be voted on Sept. 21. The tax rate of $0.4497 per $100 valuation will also be voted on then.
Council member Mike Wallace, on one hand, wanted to see the same amount of money be given to community support that was given last year, but 20 percent of the money designated for cultural arts to go to social services, an idea that Mayor Pro Tem Jean Levenick came up with.
"I think the purpose of community funding is meeting the basic needs of residents where the town government is unable to provide those services," Wallace said. "I think when you're talking about feeding people, putting clothes on their backs and getting them out of abusive situations, that's the spirit of community funding."
Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Steve Dixon agreed.
Council member Al Filidoro pushed for more money to go to the cultural arts organizations.
"I think we would be sending a dangerous message to the cultural arts people who aren't getting the bulk of (the funding) anyway," Filidoro said. "These people are also struggling in a time like this. If you look at the percentages, they're at a little more than 20 percent of the money we're giving out anyway. I'm not in favor of reducing the amount."
With the majority of the council favoring funding that weighed more on the side of social services, the dollar figures were adjusted for the budget to be voted in September. The council directed the town staff to designate $24,500 to go to five cultural arts organizations, as opposed to the $38,502 it had requested. The 12 social service groups will get $159,373, whereas they had requested $177,223.
The council also disagreed on implementing an alcoholic beverage fee and a health permit fee. The alcohol permit, which would allow the town to charge up to half the state permit fee, would be $750 for a mixed beverage permit, which is used with a food and beverage certificate, and $60 for a wine and beer retailers' off-premise permit. Twelve of the 15 benchmark municipalities Flower Mound uses in its comparisons charge the fee, and eight of them charge the maximum of half the state fee.
Dixon, Filidoro and council member Tom Hayden said they would rather implement the fees at a later time, possibly next year, after re-evaluating the economic conditions.
"I definitely think that we need to be on par with our sister cities," Dixon said. "But I think we should wait until next year."
Levenick and Wallace wanted to see the fees put in this year.
"I feel pretty comfortable that that's not a hardship on our businesses," Levenick said. "I think that keeping up with our sister cities is important."
A visibly frustrated Mayor Jody Smith, who doesn't get a vote unless it's to break a tie, wanted the fees implemented this year.
Adding to her frustrations was the council's ultimate decision on the timing of adding a third battalion chief for the fire department to help with a workload of two battalion chiefs covering three shifts. Hayden, Wallace and Filidoro said they would like for the three-battalion chief rotation to be effective by April, 2010.
Dixon and Levenick wanted it to go into effect in October of 2009, which would have had a budget impact of about $140,000. Smith, who was vocal in her support for a third battalion chief when the council met earlier in the month to review the budget, wanted it to go into effect in October as well.
From the audience, resident Leon Wilson spoke in favor of more funding for the library.
"If you look at the $20,000 that was asked for — and the only reason it was $20,000 was that’s what we had last year — you took it away," Wilson said. “But you could give it to people outside? I don’t understand how that works. It’s kind of sad. We have 75,000 items in the library, and they’re worth $1.5 million. If we replaced 10 percent each year, the book budget would be at least $150,000. I personally regret that the town for the last 27 years has underfunded the library. I take it personally because my taxes keep going up, and the support for the library is going down again this year.”
Other parts of the budget that were touched on include the general fund balance, which is projected to end this fiscal year at about $7.2 million, a drop from the $7.6 million it began the year with. However, projections indicate the balance would rebound next year at about $7.4 million.
In an effort to maintain its general fund reserves at a minimum level of 15 percent of general fund expenditures, one highlight of the budget could be an additional $195,000 to the fund balance. This budget also includes $145,000 in salary market adjustments and $276,000 in one-time and on-going decision packages.
In addition, the council looked at the utility fund budget, which is expected to be about the same next year as it is at the end of this fiscal year. One point of the discussion of the budget was the cost of purchasing treated water, which is expected to increase by $775,000.
The council also looked at the proposed Capital Improvement Project (CIP) projects, which include the Morriss/Gerault Road expansion, reconstruction on Flower Mound Road, Phase I of the Wilson/Carmel/Ruff tracts, the construction of Fire Station No. 5 and building the western elevated storage tank.
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