Waterloo Finance Committee approves travel, equipment purchases and budget amendments; forwards bills to council

The Waterloo Finance Committee on Jan. 27, 2025 approved a slate of travel requests, pre-authorizations for equipment and several budget amendments, adopted a $156 refund for curbside charges billed in error and voted to forward bills totaling $7,348,921.15 to the full City Council.

The actions, taken by voice vote unless noted, included authorization for multiple police training and professional-development trips, pre-authorization purchases for city departments, and budget amendments to cover equipment and restricted-donation projects.

On travel, the committee approved requests that included two officers for an ILEA firearms instructor course in Johnston, Iowa (amount not to exceed $2,820), three officers for an ILEA instructor recertification session in Waterloo, Iowa (amount not to exceed $525), an officer travel request for a traffic homicide investigation course in Des Moines, Iowa (amount not to exceed $3,189), and other department training and travel related to turf management, fire investigation, art pickup for the Waterloo Center for the Arts and work-zone safety workshops. Several smaller amounts and trip dates were listed in the packet; one amount for a hostage-negotiator course as read in the meeting recording was not clearly audible and is not specified here.

The committee also approved a package of pre-authorizations and purchase requests including 30 seminar tables for a new airport classroom ($4,589.70); a Central Garage tire machine ($24,346.01 plus $600 shipping); a 2025 Chevy Trax for Central Garage to replace a 2007 Impala ($22,998); GIS software for the Fire Department ($6,761.70); an organizational assessment for the Housing Authority by Grama Consulting (amount listed as $36,750); network switches for MIS ($18,280.73 plus $5 shipping); sewer equipment including rebuilds and new grinders (individual items listed at $5,916.96 and $26,600 plus shipping); and annual stock purchases for traffic sign blanks and railroad crossing signs. A proposed pre-authorization for emergency heater repairs in a Leisure Services weight/cardio room was removed from the motion for further review of pricing and was not approved at the meeting.

Mr. Nichols, a committee member, highlighted community use for one of the classroom requests, saying, “the Civil Air Patrol is the reason why we are moving towards the space being a larger classroom to allow for them and other community members to utilize this space.”

Approved budget amendments included: an increase of $48,695 to buy laptops and mounting equipment for fire apparatus; $170,312.87 in restricted-donation revenue and park-improvements expense to purchase playground equipment for Leisure Services; $5,205 in restricted-donation revenue and exhibition expenses to support travel related to expanding the Waterloo Center for the Arts permanent collection; and $41,290 to cover an operational assessment and standard operating procedure development for Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher operations submitted by the Housing Authority.

The committee adopted a refund request for property at 794 Wissner Drive for curbside service charges billed in error in the amount of $156.

Finally, the committee received, filed and forwarded to the full City Council two bills-payment items: $4,059,600.39 dated Jan. 27, 2025, and $3,289,320.76 dated Feb. 3, 2025, for a combined total of $7,348,921.15. All motions that recorded results in the transcript carried by voice vote with the committee saying, “Aye,” and no recorded roll-call vote recorded in the meeting excerpt.

Items removed for further review (the Leisure Services emergency heater repair) and the packet attachments for multiple travel and equipment-line items will return to the committee or staff for follow-up before final implementation. The committee forwarded the approved items to the City Council for final action.