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Finance Committee reviews audits, ARPA funds, hotel-tax enforcement and facilities procurement timelines
Summary
The committee reviewed financial memorandums including a budget-accountability report (planning and development revenue shortfall tied to a fee-calc error), ARPA fund expirations ($59M unencumbered noted), hotel-occupancy tax enforcement recoveries and timelines for a facilities condition assessment procurement.
The Finance Committee on Dec. 9 reviewed multiple memorandum items spanning audits, budget reports, grant tracking and procurement timelines.
Budget and audits: Committee members questioned a 21% revenue shortfall in Planning and Development; staff explained prior fee-calculation errors were corrected in April, the department reduced expenses and fund balance is sufficient to cover the timing gap.
ARPA status: Staff reported approximately $59,000,000 in ARPA-related unencumbered funds in the report. The finance team said the FC18 (U.S. Treasury) grant fund will expire Sept. 30, 2026, and that an internal reallocated fund has no federal expiration but staff aim to spend by Sept. 30, 2026.
Hotel occupancy tax enforcement: Finance staff detailed enforcement and audit recoveries, including two multi-million-dollar recoveries identified via audit and collection work; staff said the department uses web-scraping tools to find unregistered short-term rentals and pursues audits, notices and liens where evidence supports collection.
Facilities procurement: John Johnson (facilities & real estate) gave a timeline for a facilities condition assessment RFQ/RFP: shortlist expected in early January, with a spring/early-summer council agenda item anticipated; surveys of the general-fund building portfolio (500+ buildings) could take about 1.5–2 years to complete once a vendor is selected.
Next steps: Committee members asked staff for a memo on released bond encumbrances (~$27M referenced for streets/transportation) and for further detail on hotel-tax penalties and collections; staff agreed to return with additional information at a future meeting.
