Financial Committee reviews Revision 3: staff records HDL receipts, reallocates 3.2% COLA

Staff presented Revision 3 of the city's operating and capital budgets, explaining the update was compiled from November numbers and is intended to align year-to-date numbers with actual receipts and anticipated inflows. Staff said the percentage column "should be tracking at 42%."

The revision moves a previously budgeted 3.2% cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) from contingency into salaries and then into the related payroll-tax and retirement lines, which staff described as a mechanical reallocation: "we distributed the 3.2% cola from contingencies to the salaries of FICA and retirement," a staff member said. The committee was also told that group insurance (PEIA) and street-utility costs ran higher than originally projected and that contingency funds were used to cover those increases.

Committee members asked for clarity about which entries are timing or accounting artifacts and which represent net revenue increases. Staff cautioned that some revenue increases reflect the recording of full receipts (before vendor fees and refunds) and that transfers and one-time items (for example, ARPA) affect percent-of-year comparisons. The staff presentation cited a general-fund surplus (revenues minus expenses) of about $1,800,000 as of Oct. 31.

The committee did not take a final council-level vote on this revision at the meeting; members asked staff to reconcile salary lines and to present the finalized Revision 3 to the full council for approval.