Fort Walton Beach Council minutes — 09-24-1990 Special — reading text

9- 24- 90 11 90/ 91 BUDGET ( CONT.) Mr. Rosenbaum said he understood that and repeated, he empathized with that part of what was said. but if Mr. Maney wants to see the work sheets, he should be permitted to see them. He said on the statement of revenues, expenditures and changes in financial position in the audit, for instance, culture/ recreation/ library, it is brokenpersonal services and operating down I expenses. and Director presumed personal services of all payroll He everything attributed to it would include FICA, health insurance, overtime, said everything. that The was Finance correct. Mr. Wyatt said it is Council' s responsibility to approve the budget and they are asking the citizens to pay 200, 000 to $ 300, 000 more in taxes, and that is not going to make an impact unless they make an impact on some of the items. He said he in a position if they are not going to try and find ways to cut and raise a little revenues, he would just as soon take another $ 200, 000 hit and not make the taxpayers pay it; Council has to make those decisions, that is what they are elected to do; but if they are not going to be allowed to ask those questions, then he is not going to vote to raise the taxpayers $ 200, 000 and still throw $ 2 million out the door, let' s throw $ 2, 200, 000 out the door. He said they may have to increase service levels, they may have to decrease service levels. and he would really like to have some questions answered. Mr. Smith department heads submit it broken said the down how they going to spend the money for the year. are and asked why they could not get copies of that and the reasons the City Manager cut them or the reasons for adding to them; he said that is just an operating sheet for the year and he would like to see the sheet with the request, why they need it, what improvements they are going to do in their department, where they are spending the money, and then he can look in the columns to decide whether or not to support it. The City Manager said the budget shows the department request, and the department heads have been present in the past; he has also allowed them to write memos that are included in the book given to Council; but he said it would not be a problem to do that. I Mr. Council they come saying, deVaux back approves raise the taxes; if with said a what a he deficit and keeps looking at, since 1985 budget and at the same time each year since then they have surplus in General Fund. they budget deficits and He keeps end up with more cash than they start with, then they took care of the deficit and ended up with a lit tle bit of cash. The Finance Director said that was because they sold a 1, 300, 000 piece of land. Mr. deVaux said they sold a 1, 300, 000 of land, but they came back in at $ 1.2 million surplus, so they accumulated a $ 400, 000 deficit. 12 9- 24- 90 90/ 91 BUDGET ( CONT.) Mr. Maney said he would like to make a suggestion by giving an example; year ago they a decided to beef up the Police Department. they got a little more money and more people. He said the way he would like to see a budget presented would be; to year ago what the show a rate of crimes were, of all the categories, the rate of solving the crimes, etc.; and then we added this Delta onto the enforcement; now we should have a note and a new number that shows, hopefully. some improvement in solving reducing crimes; and then a recommendation or from police staff as to whether or not there would the be a payoff to the citizens if we were to increase appropriation for another Delta, either for more equipment or more police. He said the Finance Director gave an example if we have X dollars in there they are going to buy so many more vehicles; that is one way of looking at it. but if you look at it from the citizens point of view. which is what he wants to see, he would like to be able to say, we added X dollars last year and we reduced the crime rate by Y percent; the police authority states if we add more money it won' t have any effect on the crime, and therefore, we don' t need to add any more; then he would have a basis to make a decision. Mr. Wyatt said he had a problem with that, it is hard to deal with that kind of detail, the