Decatur City Council approves $60,000 financial-planning contract with Baker Tilly

Decatur City Council voted to hire financial management firm Baker Tilly to prepare a comprehensive long-term financial plan at a cost of $60,000, the council agreed during its meeting.

A council member who led the motion said the plan will help the city prioritize capital projects and explain budget decisions to residents, particularly as state funding shifts increase local fiscal pressure. “I think this would be very helpful to have those guys help us along,” the council member said during debate.

City officials and the Baker Tilly representative described the engagement as a multi-phase project that will review recent revenue and expenditure trends, produce an economic and capital analysis, and provide a working plan the city can update annually. The presenters said the bulk of the work would be completed this year, with minor tweaks in subsequent years.

The contract cost was stated as $60,000, with $20,000 to be allocated to the city utilities and $40,000 to be paid from the city’s operating budget; council members confirmed the $40,000 is available in the current budget. Council members pressed staff and the presenter on how additional feasibility studies or out-of-scope work would be triggered and billed. A council member asked whether a verbal request from the clerk/treasurer could inadvertently authorize billable extra work; the Baker Tilly representative said phases and deliverables are described in the proposal and that separate feasibility work may be billed if requested beyond the base scope.

A motion to move forward with the Baker Tilly engagement and to authorize signing the engagement letter was made, seconded and approved by voice vote; the transcript records verbal assent but does not give a roll-call tally.

The council’s next step is to complete the engagement letter and authorize staff to execute it so Baker Tilly can begin the information-gathering phase.