Finance director outlines interim budget changes: revenue reallocations, corrections, and capital priorities

At the June 16 special meeting, Finance Director Peter Brown walked council through technical revisions to the city's interim 2026–27 budget, identifying several adjustments that reduced the need for a property-tax increase. Brown said the city discovered roughly $202,600 in additional B&C road funds that had been deposited to the state pooled investment fund (PTIF), and explained that interest allocations were being redistributed so that funds and bond interest are proportionally assigned to the proper funds to improve audit defensibility.

Brown also reported corrections in enterprise funds: a $90,000 duplicate power expense removed from the water fund and a software entry that had flipped a capital offset from credit to debit (skewing the sewer fund by roughly $1,000,000) which was corrected. He described changes to the motor-pool accounting, grossing up revenue/expenditure entries so the fund has PO authority for vehicle purchases rather than a small net entry. Brown said these technical fixes, combined with conservative revenue assumptions, reduce pressure to raise property taxes.

On capital spending, Brown said the 2027 budget will include new projects such as community-pond recreation elements ($500,000), a parks parking lot ($180,000), a public-works parking-lot improvement ($270,000), the next phase of the 404/450 East widening ($1.3 million), and smaller crosswalk and lighting projects. He emphasized that projects already in the 2026 budget will be rolled forward (use of fund balance), and that staff will present a project-level summary at the next meeting.