to the spotlight on maplewood i'm chuck all i'm the assistant city manager and i'm filling in for jim hampton and today jim's out on extended sick leave and we certainly wish him well today we're going to be discussing maple woods budget years while there and left for a three year stint and here i am back again we're certainly glad you joined us today we're going to talk about the twenty eleven budget and i see on our screen we've got the general fund listed what is the general fund and more importantly what other types of funds does the city have the general fund as the main operating budget of the city it handles most day to day costs like your streets and your parks fire police and administration costs governments also have many different funds such as a special revenue funds we have debt service funds that takes care of all of our bond issues that we deal with capital projects funds which just deal with a lot of streets that we complete throughout the city and we have some proprietary or business type funds which are enterprise funds and internal service funds i'll ask you a tough question what what percent of the overall city budget is the general  i happen to look that up and for the two thousand and eleven proposed budget as of right now we're looking at fifty six percent of the operating budget is in the general fund right is the general fund really the one though that it impacts people's taxes yeah the tax levy  most of the tax levied does go to the general fund there's a small portion of it that also goes to the maplewood community center from what we're proposing and then to our rock programs and debt service but the big part of the tax levy is for the general fund ok well i think that'll be great we'll go through the general fund today and really get that because that's really what's going to impact people's taxes and and go from there so let's see you have a slide up here i know you joined the city in may i think it was the you know the city council had a goal setting session back in february before you joined or are these some of the thing goals that the council sets or these different goals that you have these budget goals are  d goals that we as staff use to complete the budget when we're looking at setting our department budgets we need to address party set by the council we need to maintain a strong fiscal position which means that we need to maintain a healthy fun in order to keep our bond rating where it's add or even possibly increase our bond rating because our bond rating drives the interest rates that we get when we do issue debt and then also we always strive to maintain high quality and cost effective public services for whether that's  you recall what the city's bond rating is that is that good it is that we switched there's a couple of different bond rating firms out there moody's and standard and poor's and we did switch to standard and poor's and we are  operations of the city great great well let's go into the general fund and talk first about how much money comes in there so i see revenues as a great finance term whether are these categories in  there the taxes is only one component those are the basic revenue categories or types of revenues that the general fund budgets for every year on the two thousand and eleven budget we're estimating eighteen point four million dollars of revenue which is down from two thousand and ten the two thousand and ten you know economies change things change we did the two thousand and ten budget a year ago and now we're in the midst of two thousand and ten so during the year we need to do some reassessments to see how we're coming out and if we did a good job budgeting well at the two thousand and ten minutes we found that the revenues we were collecting were not as high as what the budget was so for two thousand and eleven we used some of that information in order to set the two thousand and eleven budget and it did come out lower than the two thousand and ten budget so you actually that's your job as a finance manager to go through and constantly look at those estimates and updated as you have new information are looking at all revenues and expenditures for general fund and all of our funds all year long trying to see how we're doing and make sure that we're coming out on target because if something extraordinary happens during the year we need to know how to account for those types of things so we need to know where we are at at any given point you know a couple of these line items on here like licenses and permits what can a license and permits does the city issue that and does that offset taxes them the biggest part of the licenses and permits is the building permits that are issued there's also liquor licenses and you know for some of the businesses and towns and those yeah those are helping defray i mean if we if we didn't have those permit fees tax revenue would have to be higher to support all the services that are working to keep those businesses and ensure the people you know her building permits we need inspectors and planners and  offset the total cost we'd have to go through a very detailed costing analysis to to get to that point but we try and do what's fair and equitable across the border and fines and forfeits fines i suppose those are the  problems that we run into when the police department stop us along the road but the biggest majority of that has to do with the police citations and fines and tickets that are issued that you know go through the county and that's the city sure that comes in here and charges for services to sept like when i go to the community center and charge there or not but the community center is a whole separate fund that gets accounted for as a business type activity the charges for services are things that our staff doesn't turn that charges for one of the biggest components of that is our engineering fees that are build out when we do street projects in town the the those projects are charged we charge out the engineer freeze that that our engineers are spending time doing the work on those projects and another big looking at that in a in math so really even though this fund is a lot of the operating expenses only about two thirds of it looks like the revenue comes from taxes is that now i'm reading that chart right if my math is based on the about two thirds of it is going to be paid for through property taxes and my last question on here so even though this is the proposed increase in taxes for next year i think five percent is what the city council has said they're going to go is that what this has been assumed and even with a tax increase we're going to have less money than we budgeted in in two thousand and ten in the in the general fund because of the way the budget is structured we do the budget a year ahead of time on where we think we're coming in and that such charges for services are coming in a lot lower due to economic times right now than we had originally anticipated right and so eventually that will come back but for right now we're certainly looking at less money based upon the budget ok great well let's look at the other side of that in and go to the expenditures and the next chart kind of talks about expenditures these are each of the departments in the general fund is that what i understand from this yes that's correct that's these are the different departments that are within city hall so these are the various people i see the biggest are the police and looks like public works so they're the quite a large percentage of the general fund that's correct and if my math is right on that bob that's almost over half fifty some percent is just those two department so then i see we follow with the fire department is in there is that pretty much the only way we pay for fire services and the ambulance are they all in that are well the ambulances is accounted for in a separate fund our firefighters some of our firefighters are both paramedics and firefighters and we split their time the ambulance service fund is an enterprise type fund where we try and collect fees from the patients who use the ambulance service to cover the cost of the  paramedics i see and as i see these numbers you talked about one of them like citizen services they bring in a lot of revenue so we don't account for citizen services revenue for citizen services or public works revenue for engineering charges that all goes into the general fund into one central fund correct that all goes into the yes into the overall general fund revenues we don't allocate revenue specifically to the different types of departments to show how much and it's possible to do but that's not something that we're doing here and i know you didn't put the budget together for the finance department but i see that nine percent increase and i'm going to take that one off your shoulders that had put that on your because that's one you inherited and that law it really is something we're just reauthorizing people and reestablishing a budget the way it should have been done and so just some corrections in there so we're not adding people into finance are we now that we're not adding there is a real are ambulance service billing was outsourced of about a year ago and so that person who was being paid for partially out of the ambulance service fund now we're picking up the full cost of that person in the general fund because they're not doing that work anymore but it's not a new personnel in all the expenses or so really i'm looking at this and all the departments are really being cut their expenditures except for the police department which is seen a very small i see that's only one percent so seventy five thousand does that mean we're that that's soon what one police officer we expanding the police department there's no new personnel being added to the two thousand and eleven budget just you know other costs going up across the board we've got fuel in there that's a very volatile type of expenditure there's just maintenance on vehicles and depending on the age of the vehicles there's many different things that go into that number so it could be a variety of different things right so i heard you say that i want to be sure we understand there are no new people in the budget no new people in the two thousand and eleven budget ok well let's go to the next else slide in and look at how the general fund breaks down by classification so personnel services that looks like we're budgeting to give all the employees a one point four percent raise actually in the in the current budget we have a zero percent cola increase for two thousand and eleven but we are anticipating when employees has an anniversary date if they're not at the max of their pay range they may be eligible for a step based on performance so these are the step increases that may come on a on an employer's anniversary date i see so and those are by contract as i understand so but i want to understand so we are planning this budget for the employees to get no raise next year that's how it sits right now but ongoing ok and i certainly understand that i see that the other expenditures are down quite a bit in charges and capital outlay so we're kind of looks like we're delaying things and really not purchasing expenditures and again even though with revenues down expenditures are down and but those a ploy expenses even by contract with no cost increase or no cost of living increase for the employees planned labor negotiations if it's necessary of course we're hoping that that's not necessary you know with health insurance costs so volatile and there's just a lot of things that go into a labor contract so we want to leave a little bit of room there in case something happened because it's such an unknown sure ok so that's kind of as we go through the next few months you have to to to still be defined a little bit correct ok i see on your next slide kind of a pipe chart  people is really the the really what has to be done if the council wants to look at that and that certainly is a as we know a reduction in services from each of the departments ok well let's talk back to the police and public works do have the biggest share of personnel services and even though you see some increases and decreases here there are new wouldn't no new personnel but there is a reallocation of some of the personnel so that's why one may go up and one mean one down so will move and over to a different department or type of job though not adding any new employees we can shift employees depending on you know cross training and things like that it may become necessary to have them do a little bit different so as finance manager your job is to make sure that their time is allocated correctly is that i know we're talking about we do have to make sure departments do allocate their employees correctly in order to process to tell the council what the costs of each department as accurately i mean we that's why it's so important to allocate time correctly correctly ok so we're really looking at that but i heard you say it wants want to hear you say that given how many shows that the general fund is almost fifty percent personnel costs in the city are really in the police department and and i think if i recall chief tamala telling me he has fifty five sworn police officers and we did we talk about no new personnel are there cuts in personal or were none that i'm aware of right now they made like i said there's some reallocation but no new personnel really this is a maintenance budget isn't it really we're trying to get through some tough economic times ok well we talked about a five percent levy increase let's go to the next slide in the cities tax capacity rate goodness i think we talked about a five percent let me increase now all of a sudden are we telling people it's going to be a nine point one eight percent increase the city tax rate that it's a very complicated formula to come up with this it has to do with the the tax levy it also has to do with the market values of the properties and depending on what the assessor does if residential properties go down and commercial go up there could be a change there and it also has to do with there's a fiscal disparity sharing program that works in to that formula that's why it gets so complicated so the tax levy we're looking at is five percent the city tax rate is going up actually nine point one eight percent based on the proposed tax levy yet because residential home values are decreasing i believe it is five percent is what the estimate was for residential home values in the city of maplewood from last year this year the their it city tax well we'll get to that slide next year but their yeah ok well you talked about the next slide let's go to the next slide and i see median value of homes first let's talk about what it means to be what's the median value home is that the average or  median value home is if we took all the properties in maplewood there would be just as many homes valued above this number as there are below this number so this is a property right in the middle of the range of the property values and maplewood ok and i see that that's been going down as we all know and have heard about property values so the median number for two thousand and eleven is one hundred ninety five thousand one hundred dollars what does this mean so the city property taxes i am i think you look at your property taxes there are a lot higher than this is this the only is this is just the city portion this is just the city portion that the cities like your tax bill consist of the county tax your school district tax your city checks and if there's any other special taxes but this is the city portion this is what the city will get from your payment i see so the average home paid fifty six dollars a month in two thousand and eight and that's now going proposed to it was fifty nine in this year and going up to sixty one next year so that's are you saying that just two dollars a month is what the increases you're projecting for that average joe if if you have a medi value home that was at two o five for last year and it's dropping to one hundred five one this year based on the proposed tax levy you would only see it two dollar sixty one two dollars per month increase in your city your city portion of your property taxes and so  see back in two thousand and nine it actually went down even though the levy might have gone up at that point time i soon as i recall i know you were with the city but we had some property values residential values went down in our commercial value stayed the same and actually went up so we really had a shift in when there's an app that happens and the value and so we're going shifty in and so are is if someone has a hold that's less valued will their property taxes go up less or and if their value is more than the median do they go up more or is that really says more of a complicated for me if there is a there is a formula i'm at properties at a lower value that have the same decreasing market value will see a smaller increase so if you have a lower value home in it and it shifted the same five percent drop and prop in property that in the value of it dropped five percent they would see a little bit smaller decrease i c so it's going to vary a little very everybody will see a two dollars now some will see that the higher priced homes will see a little bit more in the lower priced homes we will see a little bit less great all right well two dollars a month increase lets the next slide kind of talks about how let's just riveted that two dollars i see again we go right back where we're talking about the police department fifty five percent of that two dollars is got to go to the police department and so i assume that we can make cuts but most of the other departments other than their relocation for finance there's a few a few pennies of that per month going to the to their to the finance department some less to some of the departments i mean those departments are cutting more or it just has to do with i looked at the two thousand and ten budget to the two thousand  levy the two thousand and eleven budget and the two thousand and eleven tax levy and you know there's a bunch of factors but yeah i think believe citizen services commute development of parks executives all had decreases in their budget from two thousand and ten to two thousand and eleven so those areas are getting cut in order you know to maintain all the other departments i see and then contingency it looks like a high amount but really i guess we had no contingency in there in the two thousand and ten budget so if no contingency budget it's all that's why it looks it looks like ok all right well and our last slide let's sixty one dollars and twenty five cents that's what we're projecting the median value of homes why don't you explain what you were when you put this slide together what you we're just trying to give a homeowner perspective on what your city taxes are paying for and how much they are per month compared to other normal household expenses i mean if you have a morning cup of coffee and you go and pay a dollar sixty every day for it your fifty dollars and seventy cents for that morning cup of coffee and i want to show you sixty one dollars and twenty five cents for all of your city services when you put it in perspective with your other household expenses you know it's not right course sure nobody likes to pay taxes but when you start to a worse talk percentages that's fifty five percent of that goes to the police department and supporting of that and so really when you started think you're paying maybe a dollar a v those are my sports packages and i see so i want to talk about the pizza and beer cell phones i see are on there too so that really gives us a perspective of what city services are and what's in the budget well what are the next steps you set a five percent levy increase is that kind of a set no or is it that the minimum that they're going to do they're going to come back and say gee maybe we found other needs so they're going to add more to that now we're required by law to certify the county by september fifteenth a maximum tax levy so between now and when we adopt the final tax levy the council can levy the five percent or less than the five percent depending on we're going to go through some more budget meetings this fall yet with the council to determine where they actually want to set that final levy at ok and when do they make the call the council make that decision that the tax levy meeting will be on december some draft numbers together for the general fund portion of it that's all we put together because that's what the tax levy impacts the most this fall we will be completing a complete proposed budget which we are planning on having available for the public two weeks prior to the december sixth meeting ok so all of the budget will be available than what we're planning on fire to there and you know no i want to do a lot of work to do so this is just one part user fee increases if they're ness if they're needed or not for two thousand and eleven those are enterprise type funds which are run like a business where we try and assess the user fees to cover all the costs so that they're self sustaining we don't want t that those if we don't have to i mean with the community center that's a that's a little bit different type of operation where it is partially subsidized by taxpayers but the sewer fund is not subsidized by taxpayers similar to the environmental utility fund we have the ambulance service fund we're trying to make a go of that but that's difficult to know what's going to happen there we've got some work to do on that one right so yeah every find a little bit different ok well gail thanks for your time it's been very informative i really appreciate the information that you provided i assume this is a recommended budget by the city manager is that right that's correct the city manager recommends a budget and the council makes a final decision on the council makes a final decision and so the five percent levy increase is a maximum the cranks will decide on december sixth that's correct what it will be and it could be less but it can't be more and anybody that has comments on the budget can talk make their comments to the city manager and he will make sure they get to the council in their final decision t information you did a great job we really appreciate you spending time with us today that's it for spotlight and maplewood thanks for watching spotlighted maplewood and we'll see you next