Goldendale council reviews third-quarter finances and proposed 2026 budget

Staff presented the city’s third-quarter financial review and a proposed 2026 budget that assumes many capital projects now budgeted in 2025 will finish this year and not reappear as large 2026 expenditures.

Staff member Sarah Kaczmarek opened the financial presentation and said, “the revenue collected so far is about 63% of the budget. This is compared to last year where you were about 68%. The actual revenue collected increased just under 2% from the prior year.” She told the council the general-fund expenditures were at about 73% of budget versus about 63% at the same point last year, and that the difference was driven mostly by law-enforcement costs and a new airport fuel-system budget item.

The presentation broke out other funds: the utility fund was reported at about 72% of budgeted revenue — a higher percentage this year because last year’s budgeted amount included larger anticipated infrastructure grants. The street fund showed a large year-over-year revenue increase largely because county funds and receipts for the EV charging station were included in the current-year budget.

Council members asked for clearer labeling of grant-funded items in future quarterly reports so that an expenditure that is 100% grant-funded appears distinct from items that use unrestricted city dollars. Kaczmarek agreed to add a note for grant-funded items “so we're not trying to figure out where to find that money.”

On the proposed 2026 budget, staff said the city applied a 2% inflation factor to most expenditures, used conservative revenue estimates tied to department heads’ input and expected many capital projects to close out in 2025. Citywide cash was projected to end 2026 at about $4.1 million, with an anticipated modest general-fund increase and an estimated ending general-fund cash balance of roughly $706,128 under the assumptions presented.

Staff and council discussed several line items in detail, including the airport fuel project (construction and professional-services charges were largely one-time 2025 items), the timing and magnitude of transfers to streets and parks (a transfer of about $162,000 to streets and $141,000 to parks was noted in the third-quarter report), and the decision not to pursue a Transportation Improvement Board (TIB) grant in 2026 because the city could not secure required matching funds this year.

City Administrator Sandy Wells and staff also explained the status of ARPA-related carryover reserves. Staff said federal ARPA dollars were used in prior years to offset certain police and fire salaries; as a result the city retained unrestricted fund balance (staff referred to that amount as a carryover reserve) and proposed tracking that reserve separately in future quarterly reports.

Where the council left the matter: staff will revise future quarterly reports to explicitly indicate which line items are grant-funded, continue to refine 2026 numbers before the Nov. 17 public hearing on the budget and levy, and present the corrected budget backup that staff circulated prior to the meeting.