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Committee discusses credit-card payments, police exact-change trial and notable expenditures in finance report
Summary
The committee discussed plans to pilot credit-card acceptance for in-person city payments and a future trial to require exact cash for some police transactions, and reviewed the finance director’s expenditures over $5,000.
The committee discussed plans to accept credit-card payments at city counters and a possible trial to require exact cash for certain police transactions, and reviewed notable expenditures above $5,000 in the finance director’s report.
Finance Director Amber Radburn told the committee staff have examined merchant options and plan an initial pilot to accept credit cards in the police, savings and zoning departments and then expand to income-tax receipts if the pilot succeeds. Radburn said the city will not absorb processing fees: “The 3% service charge will be passed passed on to the resident or whoever's paying. The city won't pay any of the fees.” She said the initial hardware cost for card terminals is “around 400 and some dollars” per machine.
Radburn said Police Chief Jones will bring a separate idea to the safety committee: to move toward accepting only exact cash change for in-person cash payments, citing security and centralized cash pickups. Radburn described the proposed process: cash placed in a tamper-evident deposit device and tracked for pickup by a courier. She said the city will not implement an exact-change requirement until the credit-card option is live and the pilot is evaluated.
Nut graf: The committee heard that card acceptance would be optional for residents and that the card-processing fee would be charged to payers, not the city. Staff stressed that checks and debit cards would still be accepted and that any exact-cash trial would be phased in and publicized through the safety committee.
In the finance director’s expenditures report, staff highlighted several items above $5,000: a court-ordered reimbursement for a former firefighter (Seifert) for medical and dental costs; an IT disaster-recovery service tied to backup (SyncGuard referenced in committee discussion); and a purchased pull-behind air compressor. Committee members asked about the nature of the Seifert payment and the compressor purchase and were told the Seifert reimbursement stemmed from an arbitration/court order and the compressor was a purchased capital item (not a rental).
Ending: Staff said the credit-card pilot will begin with in-person payments and that further committee review will follow; the finance report will be forwarded on for administrative processing and any required approvals.
