The workshop of the Appalachial Citi Commission today is Tuesday, August 20th, it 2024 We're like to request a Amendment to the agenda to include public comment. We will take public comment prior to going into the workshop So may I have a motion to adopt the agenda and adding public comment? I'll make an emotion that we adopt the agenda and adding public comment. Let me make an emotion that we adopt the agenda and add public comment. Thank you. Have a motion by Commissioner Grove, any second by Commissioner George discussion. Hearing none. Arlen favor. Aye. Any opposed? Motion carried. Thank you. So we will go right into the workshop Mr. Winner-Ringer? We have some comments on the public works department budget, the chief friend, specifically, warnings for trains from the reform station for trade maintenance and cemetery maintenance contract. the one-hand names for a trace from the Reforestation Fund, Tree Maintenance and Symmetric Maintenance Contract. Okay, proceed. I'm on the one-hand tree committee, as you all know. The amount that's shown for the budget, for a trace from the installation fund is for this budget year is 20 2006 20 which was just a projection for this fiscal year that we're in right now. So what I'm suggesting you do is update that with an actual number on what's been collected for the fund. And I'm asking you to carry forward that amount into the fiscal year that for this next fiscal year for the budget that you're talking today. Okay. Go ahead. The other question, I actually have a question the two of you, is the tree maintenance line. I see that there's $20,000 in the budget this year for tree maintenance. In next year, it's going to be $30,000, at least that's what the proposal is. My question is, how much has actually been spent this fiscal year? $20,000? $20,000, even? Well, roughly. Okay. I don't have that number right in front of me, but that's so. We've had so many lethal bronzing trees. We've had a whole bunch of trees down on in the alleys and dead trees. We're still taking, we've still got trees that are due to be taken down right now. So it's gotten to be more and more expensive lately for some reason. But, okay, suggestion to the two of you and to the commission. Have you ever contemplated doing a contractor with one of the local tree removal companies for like a fixed cost on like the palm trees, especially the lethal bronzing disease. I mean, those are fairly inexpensive to remove, but there have been a lot of them. We've had so much trouble with getting a quote from those guys on a tree where sometimes we get three quotes. Sometimes we only have one that will respond and we had a problem with them getting their business license and their insurance until just recently. We can't rely on just one because most of them work all over the county. If we need to treat taken down in a very short amount of time, sometimes they can't get to it for weeks. We've gotten a low quote from one guy and they won't be able to get to it for a month. And we've had to take the next bid just so we can get it down. If it's a liability near someone's house or something. So I'm not sure that would work, but. Okay, well that's what I wondered. If you have to get three bids, whether it be more expedient, just to have a contract with a single contractor to do the work. And it's especially important for the palm trees that are infected with lethal bronzing disease because we want to get those out as soon as possible so that the disease doesn't spread. I mean, right now Greg Harris has been taking out quite a few of them. And then in other cases, you've used contractors to do the work. And so it's a matter of maybe cost, maybe getting them done at a lower cost and expediency for getting them taken out quicker. the same amount of the cost and the lower cost and expediency for getting them taken out quicker. So anyway, that's my suggestion to the all of you. I do have a comment on the cemetery maintenance contract line. Which I see the budget for this year was $34,200. And next year it's the same amount. I'm a member of the Appalachia Colaria Historical Society, and a member of the cemetery committee. So I'm familiar with what goes on over at Chestnut Street Cemetery. I live in a block and a half way, so I know when they're over there mowing. This year the maintenance that was done under the contract that you all let was pretty sporadic and pretty infrequent. And my question to you is how much was actually spent this year for the contract for both Magnolia and Chestnut? There's actually three cemeteries, correct? There's three, there's three cemeteries. Yes, so he'll, Snow Hill Chestnut and Magnolia all three. Okay, right, all three. And the contract is for all three years. Okay. Anyway, that's my comment Whatever the contract was we've paid we've paid the contract out or paid the contract amounts. Yeah So how are they paid or they paid? Each time they do it and then they just bill you or okay. As I said the mowing at chestnut has been very infrequent and it's mostly just been mowing and not really trimming. Some trimming but not much. the community. We have a lot of people who are watching. As a member of the historical society, I'm wondering whether I can get a copy of the contract and look at it and see what the terms of the contract are. If you come to City Hall, the public records request will put one right in to you. Okay. So obviously you're contemplating hiring a contractor again for this next fiscal year. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you Miss Engle. I can't find where we're tracking income for parks. Last year in the budget thing, Mark was supposed to set up a account to track so we could figure out how much money is coming in when we run out of parks. I don't think it's very much. But is there a lane on for that? That was not your baby. It was supposed to be done before you got back. Do we have a way of tracking themes that are running from parks? Revenues from parks are included in facilities. So facility rental is included with park rental. So, but no, it's not broken. No. Okay. If that would be possible, they might be able to get us a budget. Go ahead. And I have a little bit of a feeling, and I know I'm going to settle up a lot of feelings because health insurance is always a problem. Oh, I'm feeling don't know. I had a business and I picked a lot for health insurance. But in the budget we have it for sale. Most of the industry has been budgeted. So we want to spend the key time for everyone or no one. I think it means for the ones that have been impacted. But we just decided. I mean, the decim's got me out of here because we graduated together, but I don't know what the read it is, but don't. Those change, if it's not in the budget, and we've got a client budget here, and some of us in jurisdictions, all of them, but there's just the way it is. Thank you. Thank you. Miss Kramer. We're good. Thank you. Thank you. I'm Captain Ginger Kramer with the right punch fire department. Ginger, talk into the microphone please. I don't want to be right there. Okay. Thank you. I'm here on behalf of the first responders. We get 25 hours a month each for gas. That's a little over 7 gallons a month. As you can see, it's a lot of work. I'm here on behalf of the first responders. We get 25 hours a month each for gas. That's a little over seven gallons a month. As you can see, the paperwork I just gave you, so far today as of July 31st, we've had 221 first responders calls from January 1st to July 31st. Just for the month of July 46th, first responder calls. Now, these warmheirs to see if we can up our gas to maybe he wears some 50 to 75 dollars a piece a month for gas. So we can continue to help them proceed either I have to proceed in the county. Yes, it's just eaten us up. How many do you have? I'm sorry. How many do you have? There's six of us. But all of us don't go at all of them, because some of us are working. The one type of work they're giving you, the one that says, Janeway through July, the ones with the biggest numbers of showing up on scenes is first mainly first responders. Like out of the 221 cars I've showed up 100 or 70 times, almost saying. And out of the Troy Seagrard, 158 times. Like the other night we had a situation. I was going for over an hour with a patient and my car said they're running because they didn't know what we had to start off with. And I leave my car running because some people see the lights and they won't hit me if we had to park in the street. So my car said they're running for over an hour on this situation that we were on. I'd like to get, say, me five of a piece for each one of us. We don't, we don't not realize it enough. I mean, we don't use up the, a lot of us just try to pay for it out of our pockets. But it's got to the point now we need help on this. And so if y'all could see, save me five a piece for six of us, that would help us out tremendously. Plus, we can continue to buy. Sometimes it's two times a month, sometimes it's only for a a month 75 a month not for every week or something like that yeah that's all I have it's just to see if I can get that up a little bit if not we're gonna be walking or hitchhiking to you. Definitely don't want that. Thank you. I said, of course you did not say you were not coming because you're going to show up. You just might be walking. I have showed up on a bicycle. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Thank you, Ginger. Any other public comments? We will move on. Miss Mathis, we will give you the floor. Since Friday, when this was posted on the website, I have met with each commissioner. We have talked through the budget, so this was posted on the website and what was presented tonight has changed quite a bit. So we're just going to start. It's everyone. It's up here on the screen. And if you need to move, please feel free to just move around if you need to. Yeah, yeah, maybe that's what I made. the . . . . . . . . . . . . . . budget. The next column is your nine meals. This is what you have tentatively adopted as your milledrate. The next column is 8.3457. That is our current milledrate. The next column is 7.5402. that is your rollback rate. The next column is recommended changes after discussion with commission. We have two changes in revenues. We have added $17,000 to our property rental line and we have added admin from Battery Park to cover Harbor Master duties through the police department. So we have added $39,000 in revenue for general fund. Are there any questions, commissioners regarding the revenues at this point? Are there any questions? All right, this map is Okay for governing body The first column is your 2324 adopted budget your next column is the proposed 2425 budget You have an increase from 271, 770 to 361, 437. At the bottom of your page, you will note that there have been some reallocations per department. Your liability and property insurance was all lumped in your facilities department as one line item. I have allocated that out to the department. So everyone can just see what each department's portion is and what each facility actually cost you. I forgot we have an election next year. is and what each facility actually cost you. I forgot we have an election next year. So I had to add election expense in. We were going to increase our legal fees, but we put that back to its original amount. So that was a reduction of 20,000. And we have received our final proposal for our property and liability workers' comp insurance. It did not go up so I was able to take the amount that I increased per department out so I had to credit $3,873 for that. We had to add genitorial for this building governing body. When you see property liability, Genetorial communications, that is expenses for your meeting room. That is expenses for this building. We have the lobbyist audit services. I'm not sure. It might be lower than that. I still have assistance needed with being in beginning balances. So we have to work through that and that might carry over a little bit into the 24, 25 year. But the 23, 24 budget audit is going to be a lot better and they should not have to spend there as much time on it as what they've had in the past. Your lobbyist has remained the same. Grant consulting for 25,000. That was in the admin budget and I moved it over to governing body. Utilities is for this building repairs the maintenance is for this building. Animal control services for 3,500 that was in police department and I moved it to this department. So with our proposed 2425 and with our recommended changes that we have, we've reduced this department by $13,873 since Friday. Comments, Willie? Can you proceed, Lee? Add them, okay. For admin department this includes city manager planner, admin staff, code enforcement grants and finance. That includes all those departments are in your admin department. The first column is your 2324 budget, your second column is your proposed 2425 budget. After meeting with commission and everything, so we are recommended changes. We have moved the receptionist position. Well, she's really not the receptionist position. She's the main person who takes up your water and sewer collections. That position has been solely moved to water and sewer. And we have removed the port on position that was in the admin budget. The FICA taxes, retirement, group insurance, all those are related to the positions that have been moved and eliminated. The communications budget, we reduce that by $5,000 and that is probably going to be able to reduce more. The finance department is doing an audit on our Verizon media comm and consolidation accounts to see what we can get rid of and And today, after our audit, we have already eliminated seven lines, seven lines that we no longer need. Travel and training has been reduced by $9,000. Supplies, software, regulatory signs. This has been reduced by $5,000. This also encompasses regulatory signs for planning when she has a quasi-judicial. This also includes our Microsoft license alone, which is $5,000, $5,000 to $6,000. IT software. This is way more than just pins and pencils and paper. Payroll in HR, this is our mandatory drug test and this is also our Cobra services that are mandated equipment. We may be able to cut that sign. I just went by what staff told me if that was needed. Engineering consults for the planning department. We reduce that by $15,000. We have the copy or imposed it's rental, our workers' comp property and liability. I was able to reduce that $3874. Our advertising IT went down strictly because I just took the contract and distributed it equally among departments. Credit card fees, we have discontinued the general fund credit card as of yesterday. So we don't want to leave that. And then our janitorial services. So with all the changes from the budget that was recommended Friday to today, we have decreased this budget by $4,968 dollars. Questions, comments, really regarding admin? Microphone please. Commissioner Grove. Thank you. Toronto and training. We have budget 19. Can you reduce to 9 so you have 10 remaining? the . . . . . . the we have we just have a couple of travel events that we go to every year it's like a city's yeah the Okay. Thanks. Any other questions? Admin. You can proceed. Building Department. The first column is your 2324. Your next column is your 2425 per Bose budget. Your salary amount for your 2425 budget included the position of a building official. Our contract building inspector has agreed to for one more year. So for right now we have suggested that we eliminate the building official position at this time and just go with our contract building official with our part time building clerk. With those changes we have eliminated 85,000 in salaries, the fact that the insurance and the group insurance that comes along with that building official position. We were able to reduce the property liability and workers comp by $3874. the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the community. We have a lot of things that we can do with the DCA and the DBPR. Fees. With all the changes there from Friday's budget to today's budget, we were able to decrease this department by $83,961. Reminds regarding building department. Commissioner Grove. the the plan and there's a contract on that is that within here you can go within your admin budget under your copy or postage rental that's your building department, right? Doesn't that building department is strictly building? It has nothing to do with planning nor code enforcement. And I guess the short-term rental monitoring program, the software. That's already been bought. And the maintenance contract is very little on that. But that is, again, code enforcement, not building department. Okay. Just as long as it's all in here, thanks. Now, that's, yes. Any other questions? Commissioner George. Okay. It's not a question. I just want to make sure what we're doing right now. It's just we're being asked about our understanding of what's on the budget now. Right? Not our opinions about what changes we need to make or what additional Research we need to do on various items to see if they're accurate. So we're just looking at if we Understand how it's compiled at this point is that correct because I haven't been asking any of my questions I just want to make sure The floor is open to the commissioners to ask questions, make comments for any department. Do you want to have just one or do you want to have one moment to make all of your comments and make you, I mean, what are are you what do you need to do I want and my thought process was to let legal through everything that she's done and then I mean we can still open it up for comments questions what have you at the end I mean okay that that that was my understanding but I just want to make sure I wasn't going to miss out on my whole day. I think we should go through each day. Thank you. Thank you. Police Department. So for the police department, your first column is your 2324 budget. Your next column is your 2425 budget. You will notice an increase in your salaries. That is not because police officers have received a raise. Their salary was just not budgeted correctly. A police officer works 84 hours in a pay period. It was budgeted on 80 hours per pay period. So those that correction has been made that number reflects an officer working 84 hours per pay period as they do. The only officer that works 80 hours is chief Barnes and our police secretary. Everybody else works a minimum of 84. Over time has increased from 24 to 45,000. But 22 of that is going to be paid by your ad men from Battery Park because 22 of that is the Harbor Master Duties performed by the Chief. Your FICA, your retirement has got to be that is the Harbor Mastro Duties performed by the chief. Your FICA, your retirement has gone more than what it should have strictly because last year's budget was incorrect for that line item. It wasn't calculated over time, nor was it calculated on the number of correct hours. So, but that is the correct number for that. Your group insurance, your workers' comp and your liability, we was able to reduce that by 3,874. The utility line item has been added for the police department and taken from the facilities. It's hard to budget gas and oil, but it has increased. He doesn't have a vehicle payment. We've added genitorial services to his department. Animal control has been moved to the admin department. We have a gun range expense line item of $4,000. In your capital outlay, we have a vehicle for 56. We have equipment for 15 equipment must stay in there because that is your taser and that is your body cam maintenance contracts and then we have a pole barn after looking over the budget we have have requested. Where we're suggesting to delete the vehicle for 56. Delete the poll barn for 4,000 and just let the gun range pay for the poll bar. With those changes, we have reduced the police department budget by $63,874. Any comments? Chief? I'm sorry, I need to bring something out of her. I don't want to be here with you. I know you don't want to, but can I get you to come to the microphone please? the I understand that we trying to cut. I do have money in the gun range that's set aside for any kind of equipment. If we can't get a vehicle in the budget, I would request, you know, years ago we used to do it as an annual payment for three years. And if I could use that for one of the payments that wouldn't be causing nothing, that's what it's for, and I'd be willing to do that. I need a vehicle a lot more than we need to pull on. That's my opinion. So if we can't get a vehicle, if I could do something with that, that'd be great. The only bad downfall of the riders, next year we gotta make that same payment. You know, we did that in the past when we was having budget problems. And it got us out of a jam with vehicles, We did that in the past when we was having budget problems. And it got us out of a jam with vehicles, but it's just aggravating having to pay it every year. But got to do what we got to do. And if we can't, well, do the best we can. But when y'all vote, remember, I got a bullet in my gun right now. Right? I'm not going right now. How many? I got it in right now, too. Is it a revolver? All right. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you for those comments, Chief. Any questions regarding police department. Our department, we've heard comments from Sergeant Grimer, Captain Grimer, apologize. We've heard comments from Captain Grimer regarding the gas expense for first responders. Will you may note that note? The proposed 23-24 budget is outlined here, the 24-25 budget. The only thing that we have made a change to is we've upped the first responders supplies from 3000 to 4000. And we have taken out the $20,000 for the fire station improvements. For the USDA payment, per bond, the fire station pays three quarters and the police department pays a quarter. So the USDA payment for the fire department and the police department have been adjusted accordingly per the bond. The fire truck payment, the orster cookoff pays half of that. So I only put half of the payment in the budget. So the only thing that I cut out of the fire department was I just reduced the property liability by $3,874. So nothing else was cut from the fire department. Any comments regarding fire department? Public works. Okay, so for public works, we have our 2324 budget outlined here. The 2425 budget is your next column. You will see that I have moved equipment. It is now a zero balance. It's moved to the bottom under local option gas checks. The Leslie Street, all that, that was just prior to your things. The backhoe payment, that is for the between public works and water and sewer. For the utilities, that is, Philippa-Tween Public Works and Water and Sewer, for the utilities, the 68,000 that was added for utilities, that was in the facilities budget. I just moved it to public works where it makes sense. The property and liability that has just been allocated appropriately for the department. You have your tree maintenance and you have your cemetery, sanitation services. That $680,000 is what we pay per our contract to waste one per year. It was grossly under budgeted last year, $680,000 is what we pay them on a yearly basis. On your local option gas tax expenses, two writing more eight weed eaters, four chain sauce, the equipment and supplies and maintenance for the equipment, sidewalk street repairs and maintenance, these expenses total up to your local option gas tax revenue. So it's a wash. What this is, this is what you're... If you do not buy equipment with this, it would still have to be allocated towards your public works budget because that's what your local option gas tax money issues for. They requested a vehicle and as you can see that has been taken out. So we have reduced this budget $73,874. We've heard the comments from our citizens regarding public works and you've made a note, your 2425 budget. The, let's just go through. So the library has a part time, so they have two full time and one part time. Generorial services has been increased to cover the actual cost. The utilities has been added to this department taking from the facilities. Line item in that department. A copier they do have a copier that wasn't budgeted for it all. Last budget. They do have repairs and maintenance for that building that was not budgeted either. They have supplies, has increased from 4 to 6. Subscriptions per the librarian is now $10,000 a year. The books has requested a $2,000 increase in books. Your property liability insurance, this is just your basic workers' comp and your property general liability insurance for the library building itself. IT services has just been appropriated per department, equipment they need a laptop and some chairs. They also have requested a new library sign. The recommended changes for the library is to delete the part-time position, decrease the subscriptions by $7,000, and your credit on your property and liability insurance by $3874, and to delete the library sign of $5,500, which brings the reduction of $35,293. Ms. Lucy? I'm upset to just be learning about this. I think it's kind of unacceptable to find out in public form that you hope to strike a part-time position. With this in mind, then in the meeting that we had two weeks ago, you know, I'm going to need time to look over our numbers because before I remove any personnel, I want to see what else we can cut. That's the last thing that needs to be removed. The whole reason that the position was allocated and the start is there was a 42.5% increase in people coming into the library from 2021 to 2022. I mean I can't begin to tell you everything you know where you're one public facing building unless people are going to City Hall to pay their water bills. This is what you've got. So you know know, I mean, I would hope that before a position is cut, things are looked at as far as benefits that have been received, raises that have been received. That's the first thing that needs to be examined in my my opinion before you go cutting some livelihood. So I guess I would ask if I don't know what you all plan to do tonight with this new information. I would want time to, like I said, revisit the line items and see what we can cut because we need that position. So tonight is a workshop. We have, I think maybe two, three, two more workshops. So we are looking at all avenues at this point, that's where we are. I know that you, the department had to ask to make their wish list. And those are just the wants of the departments that necessarily mean that they are etched in stone as at least stated these were discussions that were had yesterday. So as with the chief, these are just being revealed tonight. So that's where we are right now. There is a question mark by regarding Pals. Can you explain for my information the other commissioners may already know how the process works with Pals? So describe how the Pals funding or injection works with the library. The PALS is a 501c3 nonprofit. It stands for Patrons of the Appalachicola Library Society. It's our friends of the library group. They are basically a fundraising and volunteer group. And they are to be the last resort and that's the way it works for public libraries all over. That fundraising group is who you talk to beyond what you've been budgeted for as a department. They're sort of the, yeah, they're the last resort. Okay. Were there specific questions? No. I mean, you pretty much answered the question. Unless my colleagues have a question. Either one you have a question. Okay. Regarding the library. Yeah. Okay. Go ahead. Commissioner Grove. These are for Lee. Trying to understand why things are placed where they're placed so Achilles are three thousand dollars is that three thousand dollars we can enough for utilities in that building more year Okay, just just check them seems like my home is But it's probably more efficient than mine. And then supplies went up by 2000. And that's just based on previous purchases. Okay. And then subscriptions went from 2000 to 10,000. At the bottom you have your subscriptions. Okay. And then there can be Tampa, Consortium, Pantyndal Library and Biblironics. So that's $10,000 and you have subscriptions. That will add a county for last year's budget. That's correct. Okay. And $6,000 to $8,000 and book purchases. Lucy said that books have gone up that much. Okay. And the property liability insurance, that one's like amazing. $66,000, $18,000, the issue. That's, he just split the $66 for workers' comp, which was incorrect as well. The rest of the property and liability insurance for the library was all lumped into the facility's more line item. The property insurance and liability budget, the amounts that were included in the 23, 24 budget, were short by $170,000 last year. So $170,000 was already short. Last year, it did not even, what was budgeted did not even cover the amount of the premium. Okay, thank you. Any other questions regarding the library? Parks and Rick. So for the parks and Rick, the,000 and that line item includes what the Parks and Rec committee has requested for Riverfront Park. Supplies I did make a line item for supplies for the parks and rec department there was not one created but that is for fertilizer sprinkler heads, things like that. The Parks and Rec does have expenses within itself that relate to the Parks department. The property and liability that is allocated, probably per the department We have the senior program for 2000. I'm not I'm gonna wear what that light item is for The Dixie youth donation Community Garden requested 4,000 the farmers market Whoops was put at one and then we have the $10,000 for the Grant for the Lafayette Park. That's our match is the $10,000 After going through all the line items we have the 3,874 For the credit for the property and liability. We have deleted the Dixie Youth donation for $2,000 and we have reduced the community garden by $3,700 to match what the revenue is going to be. So that's a reduction of $9,574 for this department. Question So that's a reduction of $9,574 for this department. Questions regarding parts? They were, the commissioner wrote, thought we were gonna reduce farmer's market too, whereas that's what they're, what now? The income for farmer's market has been appropriately, matches their income. The income is about 1800. Okay, just as long as you consider that. Yes, the income is 1800. Great. So the one question I had, um, and Commissioner George may bring this up in her comments but the Lafayette Park grant match. Is that should that be considered for the 2324 budget? The 10,000? We have to buy. Yes. I think we're covering that this year. I saw that because of the email and I didn't propose that it be changed. I thought to my might ask if it were not included. We included in it. And that should only be necessary if we're funded for the grant which we won't know until next. This coming up budget season. the next . Any other questions on parts. I'm going to ask you to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to would personally like to see the Dixie Youth donation stay in there. I grew up playing in that league. I never went in packed at me because I'm the youth here and there's already a dwindling amount of programs available to the youth. And I think that that is one that we should definitely keep donating to. Any other comments regarding parks and rates. I'm facility. Want to discuss that Lee or this for this page is for an FYI. If the facilities budget has been busted up per building that we own. If you see in the 2324 budget, everything was lumped into a lump. Some, I thought it would be better to actually know what a building cost. So I have busted up your HCA, O City Hall, Public Restrooms, Community Center, Johnson Complex, Sixth Street REC, The Field House, Holy Family and the Gym, all in the Rainy House. All of these facilities have been bested up for utilities, property liability insurance, and your building expenses. We do have a submerged land lease for the pop and building in the amount of $1500 that was not budgeted at all last year. So, expenses for these facilities are accurate. So I know it is something that we can't solve for this the upcoming budget cycle. But if we look at the expenses for the facilities, the Johnson complex. We're paying $100,000 right at $150,000 and I'm rounding. It's less than that $148,396. So in the back of your minds, I would ask that to give some thoughts to going forward. Options for reducing that overall expense. That's a huge annual expense for that building. You know, we can build a building. The payment for less than what the expense of that building and I get that 60,000 of that is for insurance, but just in the back of your mind. Sure, Commissioner Grove? I was in a proponent of saving the building in the first place years ago, and I feel like it is, it's just going to suck us dry. That is a huge building that's half empty, and it's costing us more than we can build a building for. We can get a minor USD loan, start new, walk away. I know we've got some tenants that we need to consider, but at this point it is draining our budget. the next page is your general fund expenses summary. At the top you have what your tentative military is of four million three ninety four three forty eight that's at nine meals with the additional revenue of the fund. At the top you have what your tentative military is of 4,394,348. That's at 9 mils with the additional revenue of $39,000. Your now revenue, just your revenues for 9 mils is 4,4338. At your current military of 8.3457 with the additional $39,000 or yet. So for the current knowledge, after you add the $39,000, it brings it to $4,261.504. For the rollback rate of 7.5402, with your $39,000 additional revenue, it's $4,949,949. For each of your departments, governing body administration, building, police, fire, public works, library, parks, and rec and facilities before any changes were made. We were at 4,835,598. If you before any changes were made with the 9 meals, that was 441 to 50 in the deficit with 8.3457. the was 824,649 with all the recommended changes throughout the departments where we're able to bring our, could our expenses 419,291 dollars. With those adjusted expenses per the department, our expenses went from 4,835 to $8.35, $5.98 to $4 million, $4.16, $3.07. If we stayed with our tentative millage rate at 9 mils, we would be in the black $17,041. If we stayed with our current millage rate, we're still in the deficit, $154.803. To go to the rollback rate, we'll be in the deficit, $366.358. There is a column over here for 3%, and 5% pay increases, but I recommend that just the the the the the the the the the the the are what they are. They are. So unless there are questions regarding those, I would like to open up the floor, give the floor to Commissioner George so that she can make her comments. And Lee Commissioner George, thank you for the time, effort that you put into this budget. Commissioner George. I think there's several large areas that we need to spend time analyzing further to see you know what further reductions we can make and also verifying the accuracy of some of the budgeted numbers. Our largest expense obviously is our payroll and the numbers weren't really looking right to me as I compared last year's budget with this year's budget without salary increases. So last year our budgeted salaries both general fund and enterprise for about 2 million seven. And the budget for this year with no increases is about 3 million. So before we make, consider any salary adjustments, we've increased our payroll cost by $276,000. But the thing we haven't made any changes. And it's because of a variety of reasons. The first is one that leave reference was that there was apparently a misunderstanding when the salary study was implemented on how the police officers would be paid. The amounts put into the budget were the, it was my understanding that that was to be their pay and now they're being paid more than that because their base pay is based on 84 hours. So I mean that's something we need to look at was that the intent for the amount in the budget to be 80 hours, whereas they were really gonna be paid for 84 hours that aren't budgeted. I mean, that created quite an increase in the projected salary expense. There are also positions added in public works and in the enterprise fund fund which added additional salaries. There's a salary increase showing of almost 10% for one employee. So I mean I think we need to review the schedule, like what, I mean, what was our intent? I mean, I think we need to make sure that everybody's being paid what we intended to pay them. I mean, Manager Wade, do you have any comments about that? Or, I know there were positions added and I know the proposal is to eliminate one of them the part time administrative person that reduces my number somewhat. But I mean $276,000 increases, that's more than what we gave raises for last year. So that's, I mean, it's not hard to see why we're so far in the red. I mean, not all of that goes to the of that amount. 167,000 of the increases is in the general fund and 109,000 for enterprise. So it doesn't, you know, dollar for dollar impact are deficit in the general fund. We refer specific positions. I'm not sure which ones you're talking about. We had to hire an operator at the wastewater plant. The DEP requires it. We hired a guy that is not an operator yet, so we had to do that because nobody, nobody on staff would come in to take in the test to become an operator. And he's within six months of becoming an operator. We had facilities, work that we were doing in facilities and we looked at hiring contractors and getting quotes for doing work in the police department, the city hall, this building, um, repairs all over to docs and everything else. The quotes that we were getting, we were cheaper to hire two employees and get it in that way, then we would have them on staff. That was when we pulled those two guys from, and they're like $15 an hour or $16 an hour. But that's the only positions I can think of that. Unless it's one of the lessons. No, I don't know if we paid that much extra in this current fiscal year, but you know, I'm saying out of the gate for the budget this year are anticipated expenses, like $270,000 more than what we budgeted last year without any increases. So that's- I'd have to have time to look at the- Look at it and see what that came from, I can answer that question. I mean, I'm kind of throwing this out when I'm suggesting for several things I want to bring up. I think, you know, between now and the next budget meeting, there's areas like this that we really need to delve into and do the analysis and see if there's corrections we can make if the figures are actually accurate. But that was alarming to me. I think that's one of the big reasons for the big deficit that we're showing in the in the General fund there's also over time can I make a A comment commissioner George and make sure I'm hearing you correctly on water and sewer that's not in General correct and is that what you're speaking about is a water and sewer or was there specific was there a specific I just want to make sure I'm on the I'm following you on that okay I know about me it's it's both general fund were about 167,000 and for the enterprise fund 109,000. Okay. 167 for general. And then in addition to that, there's an increase in the budgeted over time because before it was only a round dollar amount put in as over time, which I don't know if the intention was for that to include benefits or if that was just gross salary. And then in this year, we're including the over overtime as a line item for a dollar amount that then recalculating the like the retirement on top of that. So that's adding another $69,000 in salary expense over what you would expect. I wish I would have had my schedules remember organized and I could have passed them out. Maybe I can do that next time. So, but I'm just, so that's my first point is that we need to study the salary schedule and make sure that the calculations are what we want them to be and figure out how we're going to pay for them. Because that's the bottom line. Okay. The next thing is on the revenue side, the increases in general fund revenues are about 181,000. And the two big components of that is, first of all, we have an increase at the current millage rate of the avlorm taxes of 269,000. But then the big offset to that is for showing a reduction in building and permitting fees from 200,000 to 80,000, which is $120,000 in decrease in fees. I did have a question about that. How was that $80,000 arrived at? That is actually what we collect for building permits, sign permits, and fill permits. Okay. In the current year. Yes. Okay. Yes. And there's an expectation that they'll be the same. I don't know how $200,000, because it's not even close to $200,000. Is that in revenue? I think that was an estimation based on the permits we had gotten in the years before because there was the Gibson project, the Palmer Point project, the Denton Cove project, all brought in large amounts for, or the Denton Cove project went to EPCI at the time, but the other ones brought in large amounts and building permanent fees and I think there was a estimation based on what was assumed was going to happen with the old boss oyster property and all that and there were some other guesses I guess but I remember the former finance director talking about that with staff. the committee. I think that's a nice question. The next speaker is the next speaker. The next speaker is the next speaker is the next speaker is the next speaker is the next speaker is the next speaker is the next speaker is the next speaker is the next speaker is the next speaker is We mentioned earlier in the draft budget, if you take sanitation fees, projected collections less amounts to be paid at results in a $75,000 loss in the budget. Whereas last year it was showing a profit from that. I think we need to do two things. I think we need to study these figures and make sure they're accurate because that is, I mean, that's a large item in the budget. And also, if it is correct, we need to figure out how to get out of that situation. If it's, you know, I don't know if Waste One is willing to take over the billing for the sanitation fees. I mean, if we could just get out of it completely, you know, we probably shouldn't be in the collecting sanitation fees, especially for going to lease $75,000 a year doing it. I'm. One item that's not in the general fund budget is a facilities reserve in the last expense to reserve for new air conditioning, roof replacements, and that sort of thing. So as we pull the budget together, I know we're not close to balancing at this point, but if we get to a point where there are funds, that's something we should consider because those future expenses are not going to go away. I'd had a question about capital outlay, but looking at the proposed changes, virtually everything in the general fund had been taken out so that's no longer an issue. So those were my comments on the general fund. I did want to talk about the enterprise fund for a second because there are some areas I think we need to double check. The first are the revenue calculations on the water and sewer. They seem low based on a 3% increase. It could be that the figures from the year before were just wrong. But if we could verify that that we're showing a budgeted $67,000 increase in the SUV collections which would bring it up to $720,000 a year. That makes a big difference in the enterprise fund. We paying only we're only we're paying $372,000 a year on the debt out of the SUV and that leaves if the $720,000 accurate that's leaving 348,000 in SUV in the enterprise fund to be spent. So all they were showing a surplus in the enterprise fund, it's being propped up by the excess SUV. But that were slated to collect only during the time that, until the debt is paid off. And I had added in the enterprise fund, like this afternoon, talking to Lee, the reserves that were required to keep in the enterprise fund for drinking water, water, zero of 12% of the operating expenses. So that brought the the surplus down. And I guess those are my comments. Any other comments? Okay, Commissioner Grove. Sticking with the water sewer. I noticed the well repair. Do we have anything budgeted for well repair? I know we have some well issues. Zero doubt there. I thought it was well six. It was repaired. I thought it was still sitting repair. We did well six last year. And then we have was five and seven in capital Outlay at the bottom for one fifteen. Okay. Yeah. So it's on there. Yes. Oh, I see it. And I think I got my question answered about the sanitation. All right. Commissioner Elliott, any other comments? Just a few. Like Commissioner George said, there's a lot of things in here that need to be studied. And because this is our first workshop, we've got some time to go over those and meet with everybody. Me personally, my two main priorities coming into this fiscal year is cemetery maintenance, public right-of-way maintenance, as well as the marinas. I know we didn't really touch much on the enterprises this evening, but if you take a look at the battery part marina revenues, we don't have the. We don't have back further right now the 23 24, but I'm pretty sure when right the year before we put in that machine the collected fees was only about $15,000. And as of today, for this fiscal year, the FICLEC, the launch FICLECTION machine has collected $45,000. So that's great. That's going to greatly offset the cost of maintenance, repairs, and marina, subsidizing police force, and the harbor master to take care of it. And I'd like to kind of keep that energy looking forward to the mill pond. I got some history lessons on the mill pond today and turns out it's never been self-sustaining. So I don't really have much hope we'll get it there very quickly. But I do think with the repairs and improvements that we're making down there, I think that we're going to be able to recoup that investment through the local economy, having guys back out there at work, actual boats and slips. In our comprehensive plan, it talks about reforming and recognizing the port of Apalachicola, which I think is something that we could do to spread out the revenues that we're seeing collected by the tourist dollar down at the battery park marina. You know, we also have mooring in front of Riverfront Park. There's all kinds of things that could be done to draw in that extra revenue to help subsidize our budget where we need it. And then also, as I had mentioned first, was the cemetery and right of way maintenance. Something that I hear a lot is complaints over the cemeteries despite us having a maintenance contract take care of it. And a lot of that is general misunderstanding about the property rights of graves for every person that calls and complains that someone hasn't weed-eated their parents' graves. You have someone to plots down that calls and threatens the city because somebody weed-eated weed-ate too close to the grave and might knock over a figurine or damage a plant that they have there. So it's a very hard path to walk because every family is different. My family personally maintains most of its own graves. Some people don't have the luxury of being able to live here and be close enough to do that maintenance throughout the year. So if there's something we can figure out either with our volunteer groups and figuring out some sort of program to help those that are unable to do maintenance on their personal graves and so on and so forth, how we can help them and make them feel like we are respecting their loved ones and taking care as our right as being the overseers in the way of the community. And we're going to be able to get in the way of the community as being the overseers of those cemeteries. And going along with that on public right of ways, we all know that we've been getting less and less inmate crews and inmate labor since COVID. then you factor in the amount of time they're actually able to work, the type of work they're able to get done, it's not an efficient process. And the way that we're going to get efficient about that is by actually paying employees, paying a field crew, having part-time seasonal help that comes in that is able to help with that. Because at this rate, we're going to keep getting what we're paying for, and we're not paying for very good service, so to speak, in that regard. And I think we can do better there. I think that the maintenance contract we have right now, I think they've done an exceptional job at starting to pick up some of that slack. But again, a lot of this comes into misunderstandings and miscommunications about who's supposed to be responsible for the maintenance of person within the copings of the gravesites. That's all I really have right now. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Duncan. I mean I'm going to have no comments this time. All right. Thank you. Commissioner George. Commissioner Grove. You'm gonna have no comments this time. All right, thank you. Commissioner George, Commissioner Grove, you have any further comments? Thank you. Okay, Commissioner George. I know we've got a lot of work to do and I'll commit to work with Lee and Travis this week to, well, first of all to explain some of the things I poorly explained tonight and to try to get the analysis done in time for the next meeting. But I want to reaffirm my commitment to keep the millage rate down. I'd hope that we could start whittling away at more this year. and I see from the trim notices that all the other taxing of the wordies have proposed decrease in their millage rate. We have some particular problems that are haunting us, but I'm committed to at least keeping the rate at the current rate and not raising it any further and would like to see a slight decrease. Thank you. Thank you for your commitment to work with staff on further reviewing the budget. I really do appreciate that. Thank you so much. Manager Wade, Lee, you've heard the comments that have been put before you tonight. And I presume that you and Manager Wade will schedule time with Commissioner George and we will look forward to having draft number two before the next meeting. Chief Barnes, microphone please. I would recommend manager Wade and Lee that you meet with the department head and fill them in on tonight's discussion so that they can revisit their budget. Thank you. I'm sorry about that. I want to explain how the 84 hours come about. I think it was back when. Betty. She was. She was the administrator that she was the administrator that she was the administrator. I think it was back when. Betty. She was. She was. She was, she was the administrator then and we went to 12 hour shifts for better coverage which just about every agency does and we actually went years and years of not getting paid for them for extra hours. And it was, when Nally, Ron Nally, come in, he called it. And he said, we got to fix that cause we could be in some trouble. And since then, it's been every year. And I don't know why it wasn't calculated last year because we've been doing it and it it had been like that since he was here but and that's I just wanted to let everybody know that's how that took place is something that that's the way to all our enforcements pay it's mandated to do it but they did work a long time and didn't get pay for it. So just kind of wanted to explain how that come about. Thank you, Chief. Manager, we? I wanted to touch on something, Commissioner Elliott said about public works and inmates and everything. I've been considering it and I've talked to staff and I've talked with Lee about discontinuing the inmate crew and just using our guys. And we have the two guys that for the maintenance, civil maintenance guys, they might find themselves on a lot more and more. And I think they're both good with that. They're both eager to do whatever they have to do to help the city. And that and finding some seasonal employment employees maybe next summer or something when we can afford it. We are losing a lot of time by having to send the guys back and forth, but we're also knowing a lot of areas. And we may have to kind of, we may have to pick and choose and back off of some of the areas, some of the right of ways in town. Along the streets, we may have to back off of those. I know that was a touchy subject once before, but if we're going to have if we if it's that or battery park and Lafayette park and the public spaces we may have to do that. So I don't know it's going to be a tough it's going to be a tough year but we have more people might wind up on our more city staff. I'll go on to you to come get our lawnmower. I'm ready to if I don't take my phone with me. Oh, follow. So Travis, me can you and Lee weigh the travel cost of picking them prisoners up, they amount of labor they're able to accomplish and amount of time they're there and kind of way that. We're doing that now. And one of the other things I think would be a benefit to the guys, the staff, is that if we don't go pick up inmates, they can fluctuate their hours to, instead of eight to five, they can go seven, we can't go any earlier than seven. I think it would. Bone grass was just going to be too loud in the mornings, but it's it's seven to four or. You know, and they'd be able to take a lunch hour. We I think we could get more stuff done. They could also avoid the heat of the day. Or if we change it to a later shift, but we could we could make it more comfortable for them and the heat of the day or if we change it to a later shift but we could make it more comfortable for them in the heat of the day in the summer. And I think we could get several more hours of mowing done that we weren't normally getting with waiting on inmates to get there. And when we're getting, when we're getting two inmates and one guy's getting two inmates, all the other guys are out mowing. So one guy's watching two inmates moe or like today, one city staff is moaning two inmates or weeding. It's not getting that much more done if you're only getting two, is it worth sitting two guys over to get them and bring them back? It's really not. So the Department of Corrections has changed their rules and that's why it's a little that's why slim pickings. So. Right. Thank you. If there are no other comments, we will call this meeting. May I have a motion to adjourn? I move. I have a motion by Commissioner Elliott. May I have a second? Second. Second by Commissioner George. Arlene Favour? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carried.