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City manager proposes pay increases and delayed fire-shift hires; council weighs partial addition and tax impact
Summary
City Manager Deborah Campbell presented the manager’s proposed FY26 budget May 8, including a 3% general pay increase, police pay-plan changes and $205,000 to create a fire‑department supervisory structure; Campbell recommended deferring additional firefighter hires to FY27, while council considered a partial January hire that would modestly raise the tax rate.
The City of Asheville manager’s proposed budget presented May 8 includes a 3% pay increase for employees on the city’s general pay plans, funding to implement compression adjustments in the police department and money to establish a supervisory structure in the fire department ahead of a proposed shift change.
Finance Director Tony McDowell told council the budget incorporates a $5 million Community Disaster Loan as revenue that helped balance FY26 and limit the property tax change. “One penny on the tax rate is about $2,000,000,” McDowell said, explaining scale when council members asked how specific personnel additions would affect the rate.
City Manager Deborah Campbell said the manager’s proposed budget does not add firefighters in FY26. “The manager's budget proposes not to hire any or add any additional firefighters in the upcoming fiscal year's budget,” she said, adding that staff recommends a transition and possible hires in FY27 after additional study and implementation planning.
Councilmembers debated accelerating hires. Staff provided a partial‑year option: hiring a January training class of five trainees would cost an estimated $225,000 for a half year and would raise the proposed tax-rate change from 3.26¢ to approximately 3.37¢ (an increase of about 0.11¢), according to staff calculations presented by McDowell. Councilmember Sage Turner and others expressed support for adding at least the January class to reduce recruitment and retention pressures and to acknowledge the expanded role the fire department now plays as an emergency responder.
Multiple councilmembers also asked staff for exact numbers on how adding positions would affect the tax rate and requested that those figures be provided before the budget presentation to the public. Tony McDowell said staff can compute the exact tax impact for alternate staffing scenarios; he noted a penny on the rate equates to roughly $2 million in revenue.
Campbell and staff emphasized implementation risk and a need for more analysis before a larger shift in firefighter staffing and hours, particularly because the proposed model change involves moving from longer shifts to a potential four‑shift model. The manager proposed funding $205,000 next year to create supervisory positions and implement the structural work that would support a later addition of firefighter positions.
