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Finance reports FY26 closeout underway; fleet fund preview shows increased capital plan
Summary
Finance director told council FY26 year‑end closeout is underway with audit scheduled for August/November; salary and benefits tracked within 1% of estimates. Fleet management presented a detailed review of operations, cost savings from in‑house repairs and plans to expand EV adoption and vehicle replacements.
City Director of Finance Vicky Van Buren briefed the council on July 29 on year‑end closeout for FY26. She said payroll and benefits estimates were within 1% of projections and that final reconciliations and consolidated tax receipts are expected in August and September. The annual audit will be completed later this year with an ACFR presentation planned in December.
Van Buren described a new forecasting tool that reduced reestimate time from weeks to a few hours and improved the accuracy of year‑end salary and benefits projections. She also introduced the fleet internal service fund budget for FY27: about $3.3M in salary and benefits, $4.0M in operating supplies and a capital replacement program of approximately $11.3M (higher than recent years due to postponed replacements).
Travis Trujill (Maintenance & Operations) and Zach Hafner (Fleet manager) presented fleet operations: in‑house maintenance saves an estimated $35/hour relative to local shops, the fleet shop is ASE Blue Seal certified, and the department is piloting EV charging and watt‑hour tracking for electric vehicles (about 5% of fleet currently electric with plans to grow). Council members praised the fleet crew for efficiency and noted the internal service fund allows departments to pay for the fleet services they use.
