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Home My WebLink About08-23-2012 city or :..� Special Ci ty Council Meeting August 23, 2012 -4.00 PM � ' ° : Auburn City Hall Council Chambers WASHINGTON; MINUTES I. CALL TO ORDER The meeting was called to order at 4'00 p.m. Councilmembers present included Rich Wagner, Nancy Backus, Bill Peloza, John Partridge, Largo Wales, Wayne Osborne and John Holman. Also present were Mayor Peter B Lewis, Finance Director Shelley Coleman, Financial Planning Manager Martin Chaw, Chief of Police Robert Lee, Public Works Director Dennis Dowdy, Human Resources and Risk Management Director Brenda Heineman, Parks, Arts and Recreation Director Daryl Faber, Information Services Director Lorrie Rempher, Planning and Development Director Keven Snyder, City Attorney Dan Held and Deputy City Clerk Shawn Campbell. II. DISCUSSION ITEMS A. 2013-2014 Budget Review (Coleman) Director Coleman reviewed the Council Budget review process including dates and meeting requirements. Council Budget Workshop number two is primarily to discuss the Proprietary and Capital funds portion of the budget. Director Coleman explained the Utilities fund will be adding a utilities support vehicle, four new full time employees to support construction projects, a customer service representative and a remote all-terrain jetting machines for pipe cleaning. She shared the Innovation and Technology department will be acquiring new software for mobile field asset collections and police security They will also add automatic vehicle location for the City fleet and computers for new staff Director Coleman stated the central budget is based on several assumptions including no COLA's and continuing furloughs for all unaffiliated staff, discontinuing the furloughs for affiliated staff, a 15 percent increase to the cost of medical benefits, an eight percent increase to dental benefits cost, a pension rate increase from 7.21 percent to 9.03 percent in July of 2013 and then to 10 19 in July of 2014 and an estimated increase of 15 percent to the Labor Industries insurance rate. She said the total increase for the two year budget period for the pension and Labor and Industries would be approximately $1.3 million. Council requested the anticipated amounts for the medical, dental and step increase be provided to Council. Director Coleman reviewed the Park budget including park construction projects, the cemetery and the golf course. Page 1 of 4 Deputy Mayor Backus explained the SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable/Actionable, Relevant/Realistic, and Timely) goals process. She suggested these types of goals would be a good fit for the Council Committees, cemetery and golf course. Councilmember Wagner would like the construction of the community center placed in the 2013 budget. Director Coleman stated the funding source has not been identified. Councilmember Wales said the Finance Committee is working to develop estimated operational costs for the community center Councilmember Osborne stated he believes the community center should be in the 2013-2014 budget. Director Coleman said she can add it to the budget with funding from grant funds and contributions. Mayor Lewis noted the Public Works Committee would be the committee to work with the facilities department to develop an operational budget for the community center He added this item and a median maintenance plan could be added to the Council Goals. Councilmember Wagner suggested exploring requiring the Parks Department to pay rent at the community center Councilmember Osborne said he feels it is very important to know the cost of operation and maintenance before starting construction. Director Coleman said the cemetery is continuing to operate at a loss. She said the fund will require an interfund transfer to meet cash flow needs. Director Faber said the cemetery has approximately 8-9 years of available inventory He added the cemetery has adequate space for the next 30 to 40 years. He said in future budgets the City will need to develop additional areas. Councilmember Wales said she does not want to outsource the weed eating at the cemetery due to the budget shortfall. Mayor Lewis stated the weed eating was a Council directive several years ago and can be removed from the budget by Council consent. He added only select employees are able to weed eat by union contract. Mayor Lewis stated staff is looking at ways to cut cost at the cemetery Councilmember Holman noted that 60 percent of the wages and benefits cost in 2014 is attributed to benefits. Mayor Lewis said the cost of benefits is increasing rapidly He added this is one of the reasons the City is considering self-insurance. Councilmember Partridge asked if the revenue for the cemetery is solely based on sales. Director Coleman stated the primary source of income for the cemetery is sales when the cemetery is full and no longer has a revenue source the cemetery will be funded by a permanent fund that has been set up to maintain the property with the interest from the fund in perpetuity Council briefly discussed the option of selling the cemetery Director Coleman stated the golf course budget assumes a slow and gradual improvement in revenue, the golf admission tax continuing to be in effect and no interfund transfers. She added if the economic slump continues beyond 2014 a future interfund transfer may be required. Councilmember Wagner questioned if the objectives of the golf course were capital projects. Director Faber said the projects are items the current staff is able to accomplish within the existing budget. Council discussed the restaurant at the golf course. Council asked staff to consider options to increase revenue at the golf course restaurant. Councilmember Wales asked for a listing of all the free golf provided to the school district and she questioned charges for IT services. Councilmember Osborne asked about the decrease in revenue for lessons. Director Faber said he believes funds for lessons could have been applied to a park and recreation account and he would look into it. Councilmember Partridge Page 2 of 4 asked about the debt payment. Mayor Lewis said the debt payment obligation will not be added back into the golf course budget. He said it is an improvement to public lands. Council discussed options for the enterprise funds. Councilmember Holman stated when you have an enterprise fund that is under performing it is time to look at performance budgeting. He said performance budgeting would give information for future decisions. He said the City needs to decide if these items are part of the core duties of the City Mayor Lewis said the Council Committees working with the administration can set up SMART goals for the enterprise funds. Discussion of the street funds was postponded to the next meeting. Director Coleman said the City has completed a water rate study and anticipates completing the projects in the rate study The program improvements include five (5) new employees and a utilities support vehicle. The Water fund major projects include Well 1 improvements, water repair and replacements and the Fulmer Field Well. Councilmember Wagner asked for a water service study to be added to the budget. Mayor Lewis noted the new employees are all contract positions with a definite start and end date. Councilmember Peloza asked what the procedures are for determining vehicle maintenance cost. Director Coleman said there is a program that takes the actual costs for maintenance such as oil change and gas and the estimated cost for replacement of the vehicle and creates a maintenance cost. Councilmember Holman asked about the process of changing all water meters to electronic meters and the expected time period for recouping the cost of the meter Director Dowdy said the City is currently doing a study of two options to give Council additional information. Councilmember Wagner asked to have the Public Works positions broken down by position and separated by water, sewer and storm. Councilmember Osborne asked if the IT services billed to the Public Works department need to be analyzed to see if some of them can be contracted out. Director Rempher said the IT department maintains all of the hardware and software systems for the City She added the City does contract out services where it is cost effective. Director Colman said the 2014 working capital ending fund balance for the Sewer fund is $6.5 million. She said the program improvement includes an all- terrain jetting machine, and the annual sewer repair and replacement project. She added there is no new debt planned for this fund She said the ending fund balance can cover future improvements. Director Colman said the Stormwater fund will issue new bonds per the 2013 rate study of$4.9 million to end the 2014 year with a working capital of$6.8 million. She said the major projects for the Stormwater fund include annual pipeline repairs and replacement projects, Auburn Way South flooding, 30th Street NE Area Flooding, phases 1-3 and the Mill Creek Wetland 5K Reach restoration. Councilmember Holman asked if the Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) requirements will affect the 2015 budget. Councilmember Peloza said it will not but he will be getting additional information to share with Council on the expected costs for the CSO's to share with Council. The remainder of the budget discussion was postponed to a future meeting. Page 3 of 4 III. ADJOURNMENT There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 6:05 p.m. APP"OV �� day o eptember, 2012 Peter Lewis, Mayor Shawn Campbell, Deputy Citi Clerk Page 4 of 4