Council weighs in on budget

WASILLA — A lean, mean government machine.

That’s the message Wasilla City Council members are preaching while crafting the city’s fiscal year 2014 budget. That came to a head Monday when council and city administration met for an extended budget workshop, an effort that saw council members submit 57 suggested amendments to mayor Verne Rupright’s $36 million proposed budget.

Perhaps the biggest sticking point with some on the council was how the administration crafted the budget, which includes using some transfers and monies from reserve funds, said Troy Tankersly, the city’s finance director. The proposed budget shows the city spending nearly $550,000 more than projected revenues, he said, but that’s offset by more than $700,000 in transfers to fund capital projects, “so that shows up as part of expenditures,” Tankersly said.

That disparity bothers deputy mayor Colleen Sullivan-Leonard, who called the FY2014 proposal a “deficit budget.”

“What administration brought forward to us was a deficit of $543,000, and many of us on the council felt that it was an unsustainable budget,” she said. “Many of us brought forward amendments to try and curb the growth of government. My first thought was that if the administration had such an incredible deficit, and they also project next year that a deficit would be higher, why didn’t they make the cuts necessary? And they didn’t.”

Although he understands the council prefers a fiscally conservative approach to the city’s budgeting process, Tankersly said claims of “deficit spending” are simply inaccurate.

“It’s a tough budget, but it’s a good budget and the city is not — contrary to hearsay — the city is not deficit spending,” he said. “You hear the term ‘deficit spending’ in Anchorage. We don’t do that. We do have a projection in the general fund where revenues are less than expenditures. But just because it’s showing a negative, that’s indicative of a use of our fund balance, a use of your savings, but it’s broken up into pieces.”

Sullivan-Leonard said using reserve funds to balance the city’s expected spending is still means more money is going out than coming in.

“If you’re spending more than your revenue, that’s a deficit,” she said. “Their argument is we have a fund balance to cover it. … That is true; however, if you want to have a sustainable, honest budget, you match expenditure with revenue, plain and simple.”

Creating a multi-million-dollar budget for a city isn’t always plain and simple, said Dianne Woodruff, a two-term councilwoman and a certified public accountant.

“Is this deficit spending?” she said. “No. The key phrase they keep going back to is that it’s a balanced budget. The technical definition (of deficit) is the expenditure doesn’t exceed the total of the revenue plus fund balance. I wouldn’t use that word.”

While she said she wouldn’t call that nearly $550,000 difference a “deficit,” Woodruff said the proposed budget does call for using some fund balances, which would reduce some of the city’s reserves.

Center of attention

By the end of Monday’s budget meeting, council had agreed on some amendments, didn’t adopt others, and had reduced the $36 million proposal to $29 million, Tankersly said. That reflects the deletion of $8.2 million that had been hoped for from the state Legislature for construction of a new library and additions of about $3 million for sewage treatment funds and $1.5 million for the state for road improvements.

Finances at the Curtis D. Menard Memorial Sports Center generated much of the budget discussion. The complex has historically required a large influx of money from the city’s general fund to operate, and FY 2014 is no exception. Council members proposed several amendments to close the gap between the sports center’s revenues and its cost to operate.

One of the biggest suggested changes came from Woodruff, who proposed eliminating the position of cultural and recreational services director. That amendment failed, as did another from Sullivan-Leonard that called for the center to increase its revenue generated by $100,000 and reduce its draw on the general fund by the same amount.

In the end, the council agreed on an amended version of that proposal, she said, that calls on the cultural and services director, John Combs, to come up with a plan for council within 90 days of how the center can generate more revenue.

“He’s got 90 days to come back and give us a plan for how he’s going to run the center in a way that hopefully loses us less money,” Woodruff said. “I’m very interested to see what that is. We didn’t get a lot of great results last year, but the council voted to give that position almost a $20,000 raise by putting it into (the retirement system). And we haven’t seen any results.”

Sullivan-Leonard agreed that her amendment aimed “to really push accountability onto the director of the sports complex to bring in more revenue,” he said. “ON the other side, I wanted a lesser draw on the general fund. It is really tough, and we’re looking not only at the sports complex, but all across the board. … We want contracts, we want surety that vendors are coming, surety that more events are coming to the complex.”

The deputy mayor also said city administration can also stand to lose some of the financial fat.

“General government has grown by 24 percent over the last three years,” she said. “Why have they not tried to slow the growth of government?”

Come May 13, the council will be asked to approve an amended $29 million Wasilla city budget for FY 2014.

“I’m still not happy with it,” Sullivan-Leonard said. “I think we cut about half of the deficit and I think we could’ve cut more. … I still don’t feel that it’s a sustainable budget.”

Woodruff also agrees that city administration could be leaner.

“It is staff heavy,” she said. “But wherever they make those cuts is really up to them. That’s the same thing with the sports complex. … While it’s nothing against current staff, the reality is that facility only requires one manager and we need another worker.”

Contact reporter Greg Johnson at greg.johnson@frontiersman.com or 352-2269.

What: Wasilla City Council meeting

When: 6 p.m., May 13

Why: Among items on the agenda is expected to be an amended FY2014 budget

Where: Wasilla City Hall