First things first: I only ask that you read the entire post before you dig in. For as much time as the Council has spent on this baby, I think it’s a reasonable request…..
OK, the tax rate as proposed by the Council for next year is $1.395. The tax rate for last year was $1.472. The tax rate in Manassas is comprised of two pieces: the fire levy and the “normal” Real Estate tax. To arrive at your tax bill, the two are added together. The changes in the overall rate this year are primarily driven by increases this year and last year in the Fire Levy. Last year we added operational costs in the form of consolidated dispatch and other recurring costs but paid for it out of fund balance. I wasn’t wild about paying for things that way but went along with it. We did that as we were trying to keep the tax rate low while the economy was is such a bad state. This year, the bill for those operational improvements has come due and continuing to pay for them with fund balance is bad policy. Besides, if we spend our Fire & Rescue fund balance on operational costs, we’re wiping out our savings fund that will help buy fire trucks and that’s dumb. So:
So, here’s the charts
If you notice, the base tax rate (on the left) goes down for all but Townhouses. Overall, residential tax bills go down an average of $14 (single family goes down $61). The increase (in the center column) comes on the Fire levy – an average residential increase of $52 (per year). We had to hire some more medics and some batallion chiefs (in addition to operational costs added last year). The medics are necessary as Rescue Squads run all the time. The operational pace makes it difficult to get and keep volunteers and career staff move on. We don’t want overworked medics working on desperately ill people. Not to be a jerk but if you’re unhappy with the increase there, get over to the the Firehouse or Squad and volunteer.
Now, in the general fund (column on the left) we killed off the wellness bonus, the museum manager, the tourism director and the wellness program. Also gone is the $1,000 “wellness bonus”. We did give our staff a modest raise (first in 3 years), added 4 more police officers (who will be ready for duty by next spring when we’re ready to start intensive patrolling in other parts of the City). We also reduced the staff training initiative and education forward budget by a third. We did all of that in the General Fund and still managed to reduce most taxes.
I guess if you could give a budget a theme, the theme for this budget would be “Public Safety”. The additional 4 officers will bring us back to the police staffing levels we had 4 years ago. If I missed something or you have a question, please ask. I can’t get everyting in a short blog post and the budget is very complicated. I’m not hiding anything, I prolly couldn’t fit it in. I’ll be presenting the Council’s proposed budget on Monday evening.
Open Items list This is a new link, let me know if you have problems.
April 7, 2011 at 9:33 pm
Nice job. I for one never mind paying more for safety (police and fire). Its the spending on everything else that gets hard to swallow. Stick to ‘safety first’ and most citizens will stick with you.
April 7, 2011 at 9:50 pm
thx countrydoc. Everyone else, please email or post if you have questions. I’m just trying to communicate. I know that Ray wants to see the nitty-gritty worksheets and I’ll havo those tomorrow at some point. Not hiding anything but staff wants to make sure that they have the votes right.
April 8, 2011 at 5:37 am
I might say more…but I can’t stop laughing!
April 8, 2011 at 6:27 am
Well, I might have put that differently….to be fair that spreadsheet is about 6 pages long with changes spread all over the place. Each line item requires a roll call vote – no “all those in favor” deals (show me anywhere else in gov’t that does that). In addition, we worked late into the night and some of the staff came in late yesterday. That’s cool, they were working their tails off. I do have the document now and will post it after I get out of a meeting or 3.
April 8, 2011 at 5:39 pm
I’m not too upset, though, being the only type of home owner to see a tax increase, I’m not happy about that. However, if we are going to spend money, it should be on the Police and fire, I just hope the schools did not get all of what they asked for.
April 8, 2011 at 7:16 pm
Andy, when I was laughing earlier in this day, it started with “not to be a jerk about it” and rolled into “nitty gritty”. Many thanks for your efforts on the spreadsheets since others too would like to get a gander at them! And thanks for the laughter on this grey day.
April 8, 2011 at 7:24 pm
Spreadsheet from open items is linked in the bottom of the post.
April 8, 2011 at 7:37 pm
@COM: I am researching what’s going on with that one class of homes. I’ve got data back to 2007 but it’s slow going for me – the Commissioner of Revenue is out until Monday and he almost knows this stuff off the top of his head so I’ll get the rest then. I can’t promise you a happy answer but I am trying to understand what has gone on there. It’s a fair comment.
April 8, 2011 at 9:16 pm
Didn’t the schools used to get 56. Something%? When did it get up to 58.5%? I might be mistaken about the percentage but I could have sworn it wasn’t 58.5.
April 9, 2011 at 11:32 am
I would like for you to explain the fiscal reasoning behind the funding of a police patrol and the legal expenses to keep Lake Manassas closed at six times the annual cost of opening the lake. Doesn’t sound very fiscally conservative or prudent to me.
April 9, 2011 at 11:36 am
Motor Fuel Tax Funds: There is a most excellent memo from Al Harf of PRTC fame which can be found starting at Page 31 of this Monday’s Council Agenda. It gives a very clear explanation of “Eligible Uses of 2% Motor Fuels Tax Funds” and is worth the read for those of us who follow the budget. I plan on sharing it with the three Boards I sit on.
April 9, 2011 at 11:38 am
@Andy: Good Sir, I have had folks ask me why that one Police Officer is being funded by the Water Fund, and just why we need one at the Lake and the Plant. Although I answer their questions as to the logic of it, please do post a response as to “why” with my thanks!
April 9, 2011 at 11:39 am
Link to Open Ended Items works great!!! My compliments, oh Wizard of the One-Eyed Monster!
April 9, 2011 at 1:01 pm
Andy,
Thanks. Though, my guess is that with the down turn in the housing market and what appears to be a slight improvement townhomes are more in demand than single family homes, which has lead to a quicker price increase on them compared to the others.
April 9, 2011 at 3:34 pm
The Utility Commission has always paid overtime for our officers to patrol the lake. During the budget process they laid out their justification and I could have them send that along but the long and short of it is that they want to increase the patrols out there. That Commission is chaired by former Mayor Weber and is a pretty serious bunch. I felt as though their argument held water so I supported it.
As to opening the lake, we’re being sued by a developer so whatever progress we were making appears to be at a halt. As for the operating cost, I don’t know that anyone knows what those are just yet. We were closing in on that kind of data when we were sued.
April 9, 2011 at 4:26 pm
Could the city have avoided the lawsuit if they would have opened the lake? My guess would be yes.
Why would the suit prohibit the city from getting the data on the operating costs?
Also how much extra is our city attorney charging us to defend this suit?
Andy I so appreciate you answering my questions. Inquiring minds want to know
April 9, 2011 at 4:37 pm
M:
I’m happy to talk to you (or anyone else) in person about the lake but I’m not going to get into a discussion on the lake while it is being litigated. I don’t know the Attorney’s costs but you submit a FOIA request for it but the lawsuit hasn’t really even started yet.
I’ll make you this promise though: when it’s all settled, I’ll put up a long post and we will have an interesting discussion….
You’re welcome! I’m happy to try to clear things up for folks.
April 9, 2011 at 5:04 pm
Funny how the story changes over time, the City knew what its share of the infrastructure costs was in February and I can’t fathom that the city council didn’t at least have an inkling as to what the operating costs for the city would be, if any.
The long and short of it appears to be that the city council chose to embark on a course that ensured litigation and higher expenditures with a likely pre-ordained conclusion that will place the city in the same position it would have been if had partnered with the developers and the state in the first place.
Seems like little more than an expensive pissing contest.
April 9, 2011 at 8:41 pm
Just as with the school share agreement, there simply is not a good reason to keep the lake closed. Many if not all local jurisdictions have kept their public water sources open to boating and fishing.
April 9, 2011 at 8:50 pm
The pain of lawsuits is it forces closed lips. Just from what came out public sources wise prior to the clamp down: yes, there were rough numbers going back as far as December 2009 and progressed as work progressed until Brookfield Saranac hit the courts. At one point last year, Mike Moon said somewhere in the ballpark of $200K for startup.
One question I have which will have to wait for an answer is: When National Capital Presbytery sold the land for the old Camp Glenkirk, and the City “made it clear that the rights to the lake would not be transferred to whoever owned the property” – was that in writing? I can wait for that answer.
But, one other thing clear in public documents – the City Council stand to ensure the safety of the water both in terms of chemicals and invasive species was not addressed by Brookfield Saranac.
Could the lawsuit have been avoided? Possibly – but a developer wanting to have a full size marina and hooking folks to buy based on lake access before it is a given and also that all concerns are addressed sure does not lead to an avoidance.
April 10, 2011 at 8:52 pm
Andy – a quetion on the Open Items List (Page 3 Item 74). What was the decrease of $481,700 to PWC Shared Services? Thanks!
April 10, 2011 at 8:57 pm
Let’s see: The city didn’t want to open the lake because they wanted to be sued, and they wanted to be sued so that they could spend more money, and they wanted to spend more money so they could raise taxes, because that’s what they always want to do because it’s one big conspiracy, and the members of the council want to keep everyone in turmoil and whining all the time because they enjoy having people question their every move and write terrible things about them. I’m especially sure they enjoy reading posts from those who transparently pose innocent questions that are full of venum cloaked in cuteness.
(I am definitely not here referring to COM with whose opinion I often do not share but readily admit that he doesn’t try to be cute; he at least states his opposition straight on and doesn’t cloak his opposition as innocent inquisitiveness.)
April 10, 2011 at 8:59 pm
Im pretty sure that was mostly a decrease in library spending.
April 11, 2011 at 4:43 am
Ralph,
Any citizen in this city has a right to question any of our elected officials. I’m not sure if you are talking about me or someone else but my questions are not asked out of malise.
Should we all just sit back and never ask questions? I would say no.
Andy and Mark Wolfe have been very forth coming in answering questions on here and I for one genuinely appreciate it.
It is better to have explanations Than to have people wonder.
April 11, 2011 at 7:54 am
Andy, thanks for the info on Shared Services!
April 11, 2011 at 8:19 am
Tonight’s council agenda is on the city website.
Please note that Vice-Mayor Harrover will present the
council’s proposed FY 2012 budget at time certain 6:45.
April 11, 2011 at 3:29 pm
I’ll be multi-tasking from home tonight while watching live streaming on the city website’s media center:
http://www.manassascity.org/index.aspx?nid=1018