Budget advisory committee outlines changes to CIP prioritization tool, selects projects for review

The Englewood City Budget Advisory Committee voted to approve the Sept. minutes and unanimously agreed to a workplan to refine the city’s capital improvement program (CIP) prioritization tool, asking staff to circulate materials and sample projects for redlining ahead of a November meeting.

Committee Chair Peter Eckle said the group would focus on identifying gaps in the current CIP prioritization workbook and preparing recommended changes to use in the 2026 and 2027 capital cycles. “We plan to undertake a more comprehensive review of the tool for the items you listed and offer recommended changes prior to the 2026 annual CIP prioritization process,” Eckle said, adding the committee wants refinements available before the city’s joint meeting with City Council and Planning & Zoning tentatively scheduled the second week of April 2026.

Why it matters: the committee’s recommendations will feed the city departments’ capital requests and be one input for Council’s final selections. Committee members emphasized transparency, balanced criteria, and operational improvements so projects in the CIP better reflect urgency, equity, readiness and budget realities.

Committee discussion and proposed changes

Members who reviewed the tool identified several recurring issues and proposed fixes: more even weighting of scoring criteria (to avoid safety automatically dominating scores), explicit markers when a project has remained on the list for multiple years, flags for projects that are already underway or represent a subsequent phase, a consideration of project cost relative to available funds, and a process for giving less-visible departments equitable consideration. Chair Eckle summarized the committee’s recommendations as aiming “to create a more efficient, responsive, and transparent CIP process.”

On project age and removal, Eckle read committee language proposing a formal sunset: “It could be recommended to implement a sunset clause that automatically removes unfunded projects after, say, 3 consecutive years unless they are resubmitted with an updated scope justification and budget estimates.” Members said that would reduce stale “rollover” items and encourage departments to update scope and cost estimates.

Small-project track and visual organization

The committee recommended a streamlined review track for smaller projects to avoid delaying minor work behind larger, multi-year projects. The working threshold discussed was $250,000. The group also asked staff to make the tool easier to use — for example, aligning the order of projects with the form columns and adding a visual separation or tabs for one‑time projects versus ongoing programs.

Funding context and resource flows

Committee members reviewed recent and projected funding levels. The finance director reported the city had roughly $11,000,000 available in CIP-related funding for 2025 and expects that to “drop to $7,000,000 in 2026.” Committee members also noted a $3,000,000 inflow from building use tax this year that is directed into the public improvement fund and the capital projects fund. Finance staff described how the building use tax is estimated and collected: the city assumes 50% of a project’s valuation is materials, multiplies that by the 3.8% use tax, collects up‑front and reconciles at project completion, and conducts audits of the projects’ tax filings.

Next steps and sample projects for revision

The committee agreed to split the CIP listing into one‑time (shovel‑ready) projects and ongoing programs as a first structural change. They selected four sample items for the group to redline and return to the committee before the November meeting: alley maintenance and bridge maintenance (ongoing programs), and audiovisual upgrades for IT and service center building repairs (one‑time requests). Finance staff will circulate the current tool, the 2025 budget update, and project descriptions for those four items; members will mark suggested changes and return them for discussion at the Nov. 6 meeting.

Member and staff notes

Laura Cooper, a committee member, read sections added to the reserve and trigger metrics and listed specific triggers she added including “sales and use tax reliance metric” and “legislative or regulatory changes.” Kevin Ingalls, Finance Director, and other staff participated in the technical discussion and agreed to provide the budget and midyear capital updates so the committee can see past project scoring and what was funded. Steve Ward, Council liaison, and Tim Dodd, deputy city manager, also participated in scheduling and process questions.

Votes at a glance

- Motion to approve minutes from September: moved by Laura Cooper, seconded by Jay Knight; outcome: approved (yes: 4, no: 0; recorded vocal ayes by committee members present).

Ending

Committee Chair Eckle asked members to redline the circulated tool for the selected sample projects and said the group would reconvene Nov. 6 with draft recommendations to share with Planning & Zoning and the City Council in advance of the spring CIP schedule. “We’ll circulate the initial tool, the budget update, and the example projects,” Eckle said, asking members to prepare suggested edits for the next meeting.