Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Municipal Budget topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Resident urges Jamestown council to avoid relying on fund balance, suggests user fees to curb tax hikes
Summary
During public comment at a Jamestown City Council meeting, a resident warned against drawing down the undesignated fund balance in the proposed 2026 budget, cited figures including a $26.24 tax rate and $3.34 million in fund balance use, and proposed shifting certain services to user fees to reduce pressure on property taxes.
An unidentified resident told the Jamestown City Council that the proposed 2026 budget relies too heavily on the city's undesignated fund balance and urged council members to pursue structural changes, including shifting some services to user-fee funding rather than property taxes.
The speaker said the 2026 tax rate is "$26.24," described that as a 7.5% increase from 2025 and cited a corresponding increase of $1,253,447. They said the budget proposes using about $3,340,000 from the undesignated fund balance, which the speaker characterized as a limited, temporary cushion that cannot substitute for long-term solutions.
As context, the speaker pointed to municipal best practices that recommend maintaining at least two to three months of regular operating expenses in an unrestricted fund balance and argued Jamestown does not have a formal fund balance policy to set appropriate levels. The speaker said the town's revenue streams are limited to the tax base, taxes and unpredictable miscellaneous funds, and warned that depleting the fund balance will force further tax increases unless other options are adopted.
The resident recommended reviewing contractual spending, saying the city has "over $6,600,000 in contractual expenses" that should be reexamined to determine whether services can be provided in-house. They also proposed moving routine services such as street lighting, leaf removal and storm drainage onto an add-on utility charge, estimating that change could reduce the current budget by about $1,300,000 and more fairly allocate costs to users of those services.
To illustrate the impact on homeowners, the speaker used a household example for a $70,000 house, saying the household's tax measure would move from $61 to $141 in their calculation, which the speaker described as a 128% increase in that example.
The speaker closed by urging the incoming city council to be "fully engaged" and to adopt long-term remedies, and asked whether the council has a replenishment plan if undesignated fund balance is used rather than preserved. The comment ended with a question from the speaker about the replenishment plan; the transcript does not record an immediate substantive response from council members in the provided segments.
No formal motion or vote is recorded in the supplied transcript segments; the remarks occurred during public comment and the speaker framed their statements as recommendations for council consideration.
