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VIENNA -- Thursday evening Vienna City Council approved sending its 2020-2021 General Funds and Coal Severance budgets to the State Auditor's Office for approval on a five to two vote.
The Coal Severance budget was unchanged from last year at $27,200, which normally gets transferred to the Street Fund.
Council members Roger Conley and Mike Elam voted against the General Fund budget, due to disagreeing on how some of the money was being spent, such as on a new vehicle for the building inspector, the raise for Stephanie Broffman, the human resources director, and the $100,000 toward a walking path on the riverfront parcel of the Johns Manville property.
"We do not know if Johns Manville will be completed during this budget season, but we know roads need paved," said Conley.
Council member Jim Leach, who has been overseeing the Manville Project, was confident that it would be, but could not say for definite, because it will rely on others to approve the land following the completed remediation.
Conley said the building inspector could receive a hand me down vehicle from the two the police department will be retiring.
Elam asked Amy Roberts, the finance director, how many vehicles the city is already financing, since this budget looks at adding five new vehicles to be financed.
Roberts said there are four being paid off this year: a skid steer and two police cars in September and the camera truck in October.
Not including those on the budget, this would leave the city financing two fire trucks, four police cars, a mini excavator and two park trucks.
The option of letting them use the police cars was considered by multiple members of council, but they want to look into the conditions of the vehicles before committing to a decision.
Elam also wanted council to reconsider the $4,904 for Broffman's raise. Broffman says she is the lowest paid department head, and still would be even with the increase, but the increase would help close the gap between her and the others.
Conley and Elam called for votes to remove those three items from the budget and move the money to streets, but each vote failed two to five.
Roberts reminded council members they could apply carry-over funds to the streets department for paving if they voted for it, and that many line items such as the raise will be voted on individually during that budget year. Roberts said anything that gets voted down in the future can be amended so the funds apply toward another line item.
Prior to the council meeting, council held an only informational session with city broker Mark Schwendeman to discuss the insurance package options.
Schwendeman said to renew the current plan, the city would see a nine percent increase.
Other options were presented to council with a lower increase, and they will consider the options and vote on a plan at a later date.
For the sake of submitting the budget, the city has set aside $1,425,756, a 2.2 percent increase, and planned for the acceptance of "option one".
Option one involved an increase of the deductible, $2,000 per person or $4,000 per family, but a decrease to the premium and all copays would stay the same.
That 2.2 percent increase unbalanced the budget by $7,696, which was accounted for by removing those funds from the streets department to insurance funds.
Another choice may be made, and the budget will be amended to accommodate for extra money needed for insurance purposes.
Madeline Scarborough can be reached at mscarborough@newsandsentinel.com