Grosse Ile holds wide-ranging budget study session; major items include fire and police finances, toll bridge planning, water/sewer projects

Grosse Ile Township held a budget study session on Feb. 25 to review draft numbers for the 2025–26 fiscal year and to flag items for further public hearings and final action. Department leaders presented detailed line-by-line summaries and asked the board to note a small number of proposed rate and fee changes, the timing of several capital projects and one large, federally supported sewer lining project.

The session opened with a presentation on the fire department budget and equipment fund. Chief Camilleri (fire chief) reviewed the department’s operating revenues (including roughly $200,000 a year in ambulance billing) and the equipment fund used to purchase apparatus. The department has a new aerial on order; the purchase is approximately $382,000 and the township has prepaid roughly $40,000 toward that cost, leaving about $340,000 due on delivery. The chief noted modest overall operating increases and modeled a possible salary change in the chief’s position in light of labor-market pressures; he characterized the added salary line as a planning placeholder, not a committed raise. The fire department’s overall operating budget items shown to the board were described as modest year-to-year increases after accounting for growth in staffing and equipment needs.

Police finance and forfeiture funds drew extended discussion. Police Chief Doug reported current balances in multiple seizure/forfeiture accounts: a state forfeiture account (around $178,000 as printed for this report) and a larger federal/DEA account (about $1.1 million). The department uses portions of those funds for eligible activities such as task-force staffing, training and equipment, but federal and state rules limit how each pool may be spent. Chief Doug warned of near-term overtime pressure and staffing gaps that he expects during the summer because of anticipated leave, workers’ compensation and retirements; the department plans temporary reassignments (including pulling a detective from a task force at times) to maintain road coverage, and said those moves could reduce task-force activity and related forfeiture income. The department also identified small dedicated revenue lines — for example, an opioid-settlement account and restricted training funds the state provides — whose allowable uses are narrow and are tracked as separate special revenues.

Recreation and Centennial Farm revenues were next. Zade (recreation director) reviewed the community block grant and senior-transportation funding, Centennial Farm rents and activity revenues, and a newly captured $10 per-resident dog-park fee that had not…