Panama City Commission approves budget ceiling, asks staff for MLK Rec Center staffing plan and holds millage at 4.7999

Panama City — The Panama City Commission spent more than three hours July 22 examining the proposed fiscal year 2026 budget, directing city management to return within 30 days with a staffing and programming plan for the new Martin Luther King (MLK) Recreation Center and voting to retain the city's proposed millage ceiling at 4.7999.

The vote comes after a presentation from city staff that put the proposed all-funds budget for fiscal 2026 at $153,704,626, a decline of about 1.4 percent or roughly $2.1 million from the adopted 2025 budget. The general fund proposed total is $67,600,000, a 1.7 percent decrease from the prior year. Staff said the draft is balanced at the current millage with no use of reserves and includes operating and capital spending across enterprise and special funds.

Why it matters: The commission's direction affects how soon and how fully the MLK Rec Center will open and who pays for ongoing costs. Commissioners repeatedly discussed one-time revenues the staff is counting on ' notably a $2.8 million anticipated sale of a nursing-home property and a roughly $1.8 million actuarial gain in the fire pension ' and whether those one-time items should be used for recurring personnel costs. The city is also carrying interest costs tied to a previously approved $150 million loan that staff allocates across funds.

Most important decisions and directions

- Staff directed to present a written staffing and programming plan for the Martin Luther King Recreation Center at a workshop in August (motion passed 5-0). The plan should show the requested staffing (discussed as 12 positions), a timeline for ramp-up during fiscal 2026, and how those costs would be funded or phased in.

- The commission set the proposed city millage rate cap at 4.7999 (motion passed 4-1).…