City manager reports steady finances, details street, pool and wildfire projects

City Manager Garrett told the Borger City Council on March 18 that general-fund revenues are “trending slightly above budget” while expenditures are “trending slightly below” and that EMS revenues are performing above projections.

Garrett said sales tax was “actually down 11% in March, but we’re up in … February” and overall year-to-date collections remain near last year’s levels. He cautioned that some financial charts are skewed by a “big one-time transfer” for capital projects and said he will present a modified chart next month that removes that transfer for clearer operating comparisons.

The report included a series of project updates. Garrett said work at the Johnson Park Youth Center pool has reached the plumbing stage and is “on slate to have that turned over to us April 18,” with a soft opening and a target public opening on May 27 so lifeguard training can be completed. City Hall renovation remains in progress; staff discovered added circuits over decades are nearing the building’s service limits and electrical improvements are under way. Engineering for Well 13 is being finalized, Garrett said, and the bid is expected to be awarded in August for a later-summer start.

The city will proceed with a combined pavement program that uses chip sealing, slurry (micro) sealing and cape seals. Garrett said slurry sealing was priced about $3.90 per square yard while the chip-seal line item was about $3.27; combined “cape seal” work runs about $7 per square yard versus about $20 for milling and overlay. The city plans to use an interlocal agreement to tack onto Amarillo’s competitive bid for slurry work and to redirect funds intended for Roosevelt Street to cover additional residential streets after deciding Roosevelt needs only a slurry seal rather than a chip seal. Garrett said Missouri Petroleum was the low bidder on the chip-seal contract and that warranty work from last year’s Main Street project may be done while crews are on site.

On technology and operations, Garrett said the finance office will cut over to an ERP upgrade next week and the financial system will be offline for about three days during the transition; council members should see redesigned financial reports in the following agenda package. He said the city is finalizing its fiscal 2024 audit and is configuring emergency-management software to streamline FEMA reimbursement reporting.

Public-safety and emergency-management updates included a delayed ambulance delivery — “now delayed at least three months” — and an LDV mobile operations truck that is ahead of schedule and possibly available by May. Fire staff completed a numbered prescribed burn known as the 207 burn covering about 44 acres and additional prescribed burns near Sandstone and Lake Tanglewood. Garrett said those burns expand safe, defensible space along segments of highway right-of-way and improve firefighter safety and containment options.

Garrett also reported that the city’s wildfire-detection camera grant has reached “step 5” of the review process and that a hazard-mitigation grant application for Third Street stormwater is at step 1; he said the stormwater project would likely remain a future fiscal-year item if grant funding does not materialize. The city’s community wildfire protection plan was approved by the Texas A&M Forest Service, Garrett said.

Garrett closed with routine personnel and program notes: the police and animal-control teams are training new staff and evaluating recruit pipeline changes, dispatch has gained a new master telecommunicator, the city is exploring pre-procured emergency-service contracts to preserve FEMA reimbursement eligibility, and finance will again run a summer internship program.

Next steps noted by staff: finalize Well 13 engineering, proceed with the regional chip-seal contract and interlocal agreement for slurry sealing, complete the ERP cutover and present updated financial reports, and continue pursuing wildfire-detection and hazard-mitigation grants.