City begins budget process

One could almost see the dollar signs flash across the eyes of City Council members Tuesday night when Mayor Bob Morris said “we’ve got plenty of money.”

He was responding to a query as to whether the city could afford a particular request.

Asked to elaborate, the mayor said after the meeting that what he meant was there is a lot of money coming into the city. The task is in deciding how to spend it.

That question will be answered over the next month as he and council members huddled in informal sessions to review the proposed budget. The public gets its say at a public hearing on June 10.

The proposal is not as severe as originally forecast. An expected 10 percent reduction in “non-essential spending is closer to 4 percent.

And there’s not but about $1,000 difference between Morris’ budget for the Police Department and one prepared by Chief Gary Fontenot.

Overall, non-capital outlay spending, excluding transfers and grants, would rise about $470,000 to $11,2 million, with the significant increases coming in payroll, payroll-related accounts, fuel and capital outlay.

A minimum wage increase of 70 cents in July accounts for some of the new spending and customary raises for the rest.

Unresolved is whether to retain the proportional difference in pay for employees now above minimum wage.

Prevailing sentiment seems to be to spend the estimated $250,000 to do so in a budget that is essentially break-even when capital spending is excluded.

The question goes back to the one of choices, which include revising spending in some categories, just increasing payroll spending, or revising revenue estimates, or some of each.

The administration projects income of $10.7 million excluding transfers, a decrease of about $157,000.

Most of that loss is in the Sales Tax Fund. Actual sales tax receipts are projected at $235,000 less than this year. The rest is the loss of non-recurring grants and insurance payments.