WEBVTT 00:00:00.226 --> 00:00:08.058 - I'll go ahead and call us to order then. Special fiscal committee meeting on August 7th, 2026. Hope 00:00:08.058 --> 00:00:15.576 - you stop for district three and chair. I guess more clarity at large. I just want to make sure. 00:00:15.576 --> 00:00:20.510 - Jeff McKim, city controller. Pauline Williamson, deputy clerk. 00:00:20.802 --> 00:00:27.039 - Thank you. So perhaps this meeting can be relatively short today. It's unfortunate that I think last 00:00:27.039 --> 00:00:33.337 - time we talked about this, Councilor Verrall also wasn't here, because I was looking forward to being 00:00:33.337 --> 00:00:40.006 - able to have more conversation about some of this. But anyway, our agenda is an update from the controller. 00:00:40.006 --> 00:00:46.613 - Jeff indicated that he had some things that he wanted to share with us this morning. And then just looking 00:00:46.613 --> 00:00:50.750 - at the elected official salary stuff in terms of comparison speed. 00:00:50.882 --> 00:00:58.098 - progress, but also this larger question of where we go from here in light of budget stuff and in light 00:00:58.098 --> 00:01:05.385 - of not being able to decrease salaries once they're increased and what everybody's thoughts are on this 00:01:05.385 --> 00:01:12.531 - entire process right now this year. Oh, Dave entered the waiting list. Maybe he's here. Maybe this is 00:01:12.531 --> 00:01:19.607 - the Dave that we want. What's the real Dave Rallo? That's right, the real Dave Rallo as opposed to a 00:01:19.607 --> 00:01:20.798 - false Dave Rallo 00:01:21.218 --> 00:01:27.724 - The AI avatar. That's right, the AI avatar. Yay! Hi, Dave. Good morning. Hey, folks. I'm so glad that 00:01:27.724 --> 00:01:34.102 - you could be with us today. So I was just going over the agenda review and approval. We're going to 00:01:34.102 --> 00:01:40.799 - have an update from Jeff first. He just wanted a few minutes. And then we're going to talk about elected 00:01:40.799 --> 00:01:47.368 - official salary stuff. And I think last time we talked about this, you weren't able to join us. So I'm 00:01:47.368 --> 00:01:50.302 - really glad that you managed to log on today. 00:01:51.010 --> 00:01:56.787 - As long as that looks good to everybody, great. Jeff, why don't you go ahead and take it away with what 00:01:56.787 --> 00:02:02.620 - it is that you want to share. Thank you very much. I have a couple of things and the things keep getting 00:02:02.620 --> 00:02:08.286 - added to the list of things I want to inform you about. The first thing I just wanted to do is really 00:02:08.286 --> 00:02:13.841 - give Council Member Stossberg applause for an exceptionally well-done and informative report on the 00:02:13.841 --> 00:02:17.118 - lead issues that we're facing, that you did a great job of 00:02:17.218 --> 00:02:23.886 - distilling all the stuff from AIM and Reedy in a way that was, I think, really useful to everybody. 00:02:23.886 --> 00:02:30.621 - So thank you for that. I did, there was one, realized just today, this morning came to me, there was 00:02:30.621 --> 00:02:37.890 - one comment I kind of wanted to add to the entire thing that I know Reedy mentioned, but it's just important 00:02:37.890 --> 00:02:44.158 - to keep in mind as we move forward with all these numbers. The city's ability to raise lists, 00:02:44.738 --> 00:02:51.999 - the amount of money that the city can raise depends on basically a guess of the adjusted gross income 00:02:51.999 --> 00:02:59.473 - of the city. Well, for the full county, we know exactly what the AGI is. We know basically to the dollar 00:02:59.473 --> 00:03:06.591 - of what or very close of what accounting rate will bring in. We really do not know what a city rate 00:03:06.591 --> 00:03:08.798 - will bring in and I think both 00:03:09.090 --> 00:03:15.816 - aim and really are using different ways of getting the numbers, but ultimately it comes down to just 00:03:15.816 --> 00:03:22.476 - estimating based on census data. So just kind of want to make clear that there's a high uncertainty 00:03:22.476 --> 00:03:29.135 - when we talk about the amount of money that specifically can be raised within the city. And I think 00:03:29.135 --> 00:03:35.262 - the really important thing to mention about that is it just shows how broken the system is. 00:03:35.714 --> 00:03:43.512 - in that you all are being or possibly be asked to make these decisions based on a new law, a new structure 00:03:43.512 --> 00:03:51.018 - without the state having released any specific numbers that you can base your decisions. I just wanted 00:03:51.018 --> 00:03:58.451 - to throw in that there is a big uncertainty factor there, bigger than for other labor related issues. 00:03:58.451 --> 00:04:05.374 - The budget process, just wanted to put that in context a little. As you know, the budget book, 00:04:05.602 --> 00:04:13.913 - and the raw data set have been released. I encourage you to use the raw data set if you're a fan of 00:04:13.913 --> 00:04:22.391 - Excel and can do pivot tables. It's a really good way of doing, of kind of pouring through the budget 00:04:22.391 --> 00:04:30.702 - proposal if you want additional information from the past added. I can do that. I mean, it may take 00:04:30.702 --> 00:04:34.110 - some effort, but I wanna make it useful. 00:04:34.402 --> 00:04:40.802 - The budget presentations have been scheduled for August 17th, 19th, 24th, and 26th. And the reason why 00:04:40.802 --> 00:04:47.140 - I mention that is that all of this, the budget proposal, the budget book, the raw data set, and those 00:04:47.140 --> 00:04:53.602 - budget proposals or budget presentations in August are all essentially informal or non-binding pre-work 00:04:53.602 --> 00:05:00.250 - that we do with the budget. They're an opportunity for dialogue between the administration and the council 00:05:00.250 --> 00:05:01.182 - on the budget. 00:05:01.538 --> 00:05:08.617 - And things really become official when the proposed budget is actually officially advertised to the 00:05:08.617 --> 00:05:16.121 - public. That will likely happen in early September. It has to happen at least 10 days before the official 00:05:16.121 --> 00:05:23.413 - budget hearing. When the budget is advertised, it becomes available on the state's gateway system. And 00:05:23.413 --> 00:05:28.510 - like I said, that's kind of the real first formal action of the budget. 00:05:28.866 --> 00:05:35.108 - The official budget hearing for the budget is scheduled for Wednesday, September 23rd at 6.30 PM. 00:05:35.108 --> 00:05:41.606 - And again, the budget has to be advertised at least 10 days before that. So our advertisement will go 00:05:41.606 --> 00:05:48.294 - out no later than September 13th. And then the final budget adoption is scheduled for Wednesday, October 00:05:48.294 --> 00:05:54.791 - 7th at 6.30 PM. So that's the budget process. Anybody have any kind of questions or anything you want 00:05:54.791 --> 00:05:56.766 - to know about these proposals? 00:05:57.186 --> 00:06:05.247 - Sorry, I just want to find kind of fast. So when do you have to put the figure, the proposal into gateway? 00:06:05.247 --> 00:06:12.555 - It would be 10 days, but so September 13th is the latest. It can be done earlier. And it really, 00:06:12.555 --> 00:06:20.088 - you know, days before the official. Yes. Council member Dave, you have a hearing about. Yeah, I do. 00:06:20.088 --> 00:06:26.718 - Can you hear me? Yeah. So, Jeff, you referenced population having a bearing on revenue. 00:06:27.170 --> 00:06:35.306 - and there was an undercount in the last census because of COVID. Are we in any position to request a, 00:06:35.306 --> 00:06:43.282 - I know census usually occur every 10 years, but I think they can occur more frequently. And I think 00:06:43.282 --> 00:06:51.418 - that we've got a good case rather than waiting another four years or whatever for the next census. Is 00:06:51.418 --> 00:06:55.486 - that relevant or could you address that? It isn't. 00:06:55.618 --> 00:07:03.880 - First of all, it is relevant in some ways, and that adjustment has actually already been made. Actually, 00:07:03.880 --> 00:07:11.827 - if you look at the census numbers, they occur in these four-year blocks. There's a term that's used, 00:07:11.827 --> 00:07:20.089 - vintage, four-year vintage. The most recent vintage has actually been updated to essentially accommodate 00:07:20.089 --> 00:07:24.574 - for the fact that it was undercounted during the census. 00:07:24.738 --> 00:07:32.251 - with respect to local income tax, it's not really based on population, it's based on income. What really 00:07:32.251 --> 00:07:39.407 - matters is how much income is earned by people who live in the city. That's an actual figure, not a 00:07:39.407 --> 00:07:47.135 - census count. That really depends on how much money has been reported to the Indiana Department of Revenue. 00:07:47.135 --> 00:07:49.854 - That's where those matters come from. 00:07:50.210 --> 00:08:02.527 - the population is important to a lot of things, but not specifically to this. Colleen, can you turn 00:08:02.527 --> 00:08:13.982 - them up a little bit? Dave, I think you just froze. We're not really hearing. You're frozen. 00:08:16.578 --> 00:08:28.416 - Probably not here now. Yeah, he might not be here right now either. I have a question while we're waiting 00:08:28.416 --> 00:08:39.585 - for Dave to unfreeze. Just think of other revenue. Wait, Dave, you were frozen there. Can you start 00:08:39.585 --> 00:08:46.174 - over? I'm content. Thank you for answering. OK, thank you. 00:08:46.498 --> 00:08:52.694 - I'm good. I think this is more of like a statement, but one of the things you mentioned was the informal 00:08:52.694 --> 00:08:58.830 - nature of the budget presentations and about that it's really this partly a dialogue thing. I just want 00:08:58.830 --> 00:09:04.849 - to really emphasize that to the public too, because last year, if I recall correctly, there was maybe 00:09:04.849 --> 00:09:10.278 - one public comment through the entire budget presentations and at every single one of these 00:09:10.278 --> 00:09:14.526 - budget presentations, there's an opportunity for the public to comment. 00:09:14.690 --> 00:09:21.985 - And we just got hardly any comments last year at all. And so is there a plan for advertising those in 00:09:21.985 --> 00:09:27.134 - any way to try to get more of the public or well, maybe we think about. 00:09:27.330 --> 00:09:34.057 - doing that. Yeah, I mean, the administration has time out of press release and the city's budget website 00:09:34.057 --> 00:09:40.975 - does have the dates and the specific departments that are presenting on each day. I mean, I would encourage 00:09:40.975 --> 00:09:47.446 - you as elected officials also to just use your channels to communicate and solicit. So yeah, I'm not 00:09:47.446 --> 00:09:53.852 - sure how many people are online right now at this meeting. There's actually 11 participants. That's 00:09:53.852 --> 00:09:55.902 - a bunch of AI participants too. 00:09:56.930 --> 00:10:03.029 - I'm not sure how many of your own people versus note takers, but pass that around. All you folks that 00:10:03.029 --> 00:10:09.008 - are here to come and look at that for comments as anybody feels led. And then again, there are also 00:10:09.008 --> 00:10:14.988 - multiple opportunities. So there are the opportunities in your budget, in the budget presentations, 00:10:14.988 --> 00:10:21.565 - but the quote unquote informal parts. And then in the official budget hearing after the budget is advertised, 00:10:21.565 --> 00:10:24.734 - there's additional opportunities for public comment. 00:10:24.834 --> 00:10:33.607 - additional opportunities in the budget adoption process. Great. Thank you. Yeah, sorry. So in the budget 00:10:33.607 --> 00:10:40.542 - memo, one of the things that I mentioned is that particularly on the revenue side, 00:10:40.642 --> 00:10:46.218 - just a lot of things we didn't know. We don't know at the time the memo was written, and so we keep 00:10:46.218 --> 00:10:51.905 - getting additional information, and I just wanted to give you a couple of kind of important points of 00:10:51.905 --> 00:10:57.704 - additional revenue information that we've received since the memo. The first one actually is an outlet, 00:10:57.704 --> 00:11:03.838 - and it actually came during the while I was writing the memo, and so I kind of incorporated some really rough 00:11:03.970 --> 00:11:18.864 - estimates into my numbers, but there's still more to come that we don't know. This is about how the 00:11:18.864 --> 00:11:33.758 - lit numbers are communicated. The first step in the process is that the Indiana State Budget Agency 00:11:34.146 --> 00:11:40.583 - provides the overall lit numbers at county-wide level. What that really does is that's your first cut 00:11:40.583 --> 00:11:47.019 - at, well, really, how much did our income grow and therefore our income taxes grow. It's a good proxy 00:11:47.019 --> 00:11:53.393 - for how much ultimately the city, the county, and the other units are going to get. That information 00:11:53.393 --> 00:11:59.956 - just came out this last weekend. If you actually want to see that information live, you go to the state 00:11:59.956 --> 00:12:03.742 - budget agency website, state and local revenue information, 00:12:04.450 --> 00:12:11.771 - local income information and there's local income tax data. And there we have 2027 certified calculations. 00:12:11.771 --> 00:12:18.818 - That's the new information that we just got. And this is a great, I love this report. I mean, it's not 00:12:18.818 --> 00:12:25.659 - very long, but what it does is it provides the amount of income tax countywide for every county for 00:12:25.659 --> 00:12:32.638 - each of the different income tax buckets. And so you can actually, so if we go down to Monroe County, 00:12:33.762 --> 00:12:41.919 - you can see how, and I'll break something up soon, but you can see exactly how much in certified shares, 00:12:41.919 --> 00:12:49.766 - public safety, economic development, correctional facilities, which goes just to the county property 00:12:49.766 --> 00:12:57.612 - tax relief, and special purpose, which also goes directly to the county. But you can see county-wide 00:12:57.612 --> 00:12:59.166 - how much revenue is 00:12:59.586 --> 00:13:13.687 - going to be there for 2027 and so. Can you share that link in the chat maybe of the zoom. Yes, so that 00:13:13.687 --> 00:13:25.598 - then it's. Mark easily available I suppose. Or. Yes, there's. A better way to do that. 00:13:40.706 --> 00:13:47.512 - It keeps giving me the local up. Okay. Maybe we could just share those as like supplementary material. 00:13:47.512 --> 00:13:54.186 - Yeah. Yeah. Because the public might be interested in looking at that. Yeah, definitely. It's easier 00:13:54.186 --> 00:14:00.926 - to have a link available somewhere to this information. Right. Yeah. So we can talk about that later. 00:14:01.122 --> 00:14:09.079 - Then I just want to show you what that means overall. Essentially, if we compare it to the 2026 numbers, 00:14:09.079 --> 00:14:17.111 - we get a 5.38 percent increase in local income tax. That's a decent number. It's not for the city. That's 00:14:17.111 --> 00:14:24.765 - county as a whole. We don't know the city yet. That's the county as a whole. We know that we brought 00:14:24.765 --> 00:14:27.038 - in a big 5.38 percent more in 00:14:27.138 --> 00:14:33.980 - local income tax that'll be distributed in 2026. If you look at the, I don't have those numbers right 00:14:33.980 --> 00:14:40.822 - up here, but when they came out, I looked at them compared to other counties and we're in the middle. 00:14:40.822 --> 00:14:47.730 - There are counties that were much lower than there are counties like I think Hamilton County that have 00:14:47.730 --> 00:14:54.639 - a 15 percent increase, which probably doesn't come as a surprise to anybody. But I would say that it's 00:14:54.639 --> 00:14:57.054 - relatively good views. In the past, 00:14:57.378 --> 00:15:08.000 - In 2026, the city received 37.55% of the certified shares, 41.88% of the public safety, and 56.66% of 00:15:08.000 --> 00:15:18.622 - economic development. And so I used those same percentages, and then I discounted them by 25% just to 00:15:18.622 --> 00:15:24.766 - be conservative in the estimates that I put in the budget. 00:15:25.058 --> 00:15:32.514 - But the idea is, this is what we know now, and we just learned. Later in the month, we will receive 00:15:32.514 --> 00:15:40.045 - the first distribution, and it won't come from the state budget agency, it comes from the Department 00:15:40.045 --> 00:15:47.575 - of Local Government and Finance, and it'll show the actual estimated distributions to each township, 00:15:47.575 --> 00:15:50.334 - to each city, the county, and so on. 00:15:50.978 --> 00:15:57.887 - Then there's a third, and then there's final estimate that we'll receive later. Right now, 00:15:57.887 --> 00:16:06.011 - we know county-wide, we don't know exactly where the city, but based on the past, yes. Is this the process 00:16:06.011 --> 00:16:13.603 - that happens every year in terms of when you create the budget for the next year, you're estimating 00:16:13.603 --> 00:16:18.462 - how much a lit you're going to get, and so that could also then 00:16:18.722 --> 00:16:24.775 - I feel like last year, I remember there being some discrepancies between the budget book and then the 00:16:24.775 --> 00:16:30.828 - actual. Oh, there will be. I think that's very pointed out. That would be one of the reasons for some 00:16:30.828 --> 00:16:36.941 - of those discrepancies, this sort of weight breaking. Yeah, there's a number of things that I've tried 00:16:36.941 --> 00:16:42.935 - to say that carried out at the very beginning of the memo. The revenues are going to change. They're 00:16:42.935 --> 00:16:47.326 - going to change throughout the process as we learn new information. Okay. 00:16:47.746 --> 00:16:56.936 - And then the estimates though that you guys are doing are based on pretty conservative revenues. Wow. 00:16:56.936 --> 00:17:05.945 - Well, overall. Yeah. I mean, I would say, right. But accurate, conservative as opposed to accurate, 00:17:05.945 --> 00:17:12.702 - like hopeful. Yeah. In my opinion, it's better to like guess low for like, 00:17:12.802 --> 00:17:22.171 - expenditure like for revenues. Yeah. Some of that is projecting. So yeah, that's why I use the 22% discount 00:17:22.171 --> 00:17:30.933 - factor in case we wind up. I mean, we know what the overall is, but in case the county winds up with 00:17:30.933 --> 00:17:40.042 - more, you know, higher percentage of that growth. So as we move from the budget presentations to council 00:17:40.042 --> 00:17:42.558 - to the official members, um, 00:17:44.322 --> 00:17:50.842 - I think part of the problem last year is that there wasn't enough explanation of changes. So just to 00:17:50.842 --> 00:17:57.556 - flag that for you, it would just be fair to explain what changes took place and why. OK. So yeah, there 00:17:57.556 --> 00:18:04.205 - definitely will be on the revenue side. There will be changes. OK. And then so that's the local income 00:18:04.205 --> 00:18:10.725 - tax. Let's see. What's next? You do have a lot of this. But it's all changes that happen already. So 00:18:10.725 --> 00:18:13.694 - it's all exactly relevant to this discussion. 00:18:13.890 --> 00:18:23.453 - This is the good news and bad news of property tax. You already know about the 6 percent maximum levy 00:18:23.453 --> 00:18:33.390 - growth portions. That's the property tax increase we get each year. That's based on the six-year non-farm 00:18:33.390 --> 00:18:43.422 - income growth moving average. It's been statutorily capped 4 percent until this year that statute expired. 00:18:43.682 --> 00:18:51.987 - So it now reverts to kind of what it actually is based on income growth, and that's 6%. So that's the 00:18:51.987 --> 00:19:00.291 - good news. Now, the bad news is that just yesterday, about two days ago, we received the net assessed 00:19:00.291 --> 00:19:08.596 - value numbers for the property tax base that property tax is based on. And what we're seeing now, and 00:19:08.596 --> 00:19:11.934 - I've got those numbers up on the screen, 00:19:12.322 --> 00:19:19.779 - that we're seeing for Bloomington. You remember Bloomington is made up of four taxing districts, Bloomington 00:19:19.779 --> 00:19:27.235 - Township, Perry Township, Van Buren Township, and Richland Township. The portions of each of those townships 00:19:27.235 --> 00:19:34.145 - are within the city limits. And that, the assessed value went down by 142 million from 2026 to 2027. 00:19:34.145 --> 00:19:41.054 - So yeah, that's a lot of money. Now, why did it go down? It went, this is a direct impacted SEA one. 00:19:41.442 --> 00:19:52.267 - It went down mainly because of the additional exemption or deductions given to owners of rental properties. 00:19:52.267 --> 00:20:02.591 - One of the big SEA 1 innovations was to, sorry, in the past, almost all of the property tax deductions 00:20:02.591 --> 00:20:07.102 - and exemptions have been only to homesteads. 00:20:07.426 --> 00:20:15.211 - But with SEA-1, some of those deductions are now given to rental owners as well. And this particularly 00:20:15.211 --> 00:20:22.770 - disproportionately affects Bloomington because we have so many, about 50% of our net assessed value 00:20:22.770 --> 00:20:30.556 - in the city is round-up pumping. So that means that this SEA-1 affects Bloomington disproportionately. 00:20:30.556 --> 00:20:35.998 - And so we've got the exemptions for rental housing phases in over time. 00:20:36.450 --> 00:20:45.529 - It was 6% in 2026, 12% in 2027. And that's the big impact that we're seeing this year. That's going 00:20:45.529 --> 00:20:54.880 - to continue to go up 19%, 25, 30, 33, 24. So we're going to continue to see the net assessed value get 00:20:54.880 --> 00:21:04.958 - hit because of these deductions to over-survival efforts. Yeah. I want you to say that just a second again for 00:21:05.538 --> 00:21:13.253 - folks in the room and anybody who might watch with that number, it's that huge deductions just went 00:21:13.253 --> 00:21:21.121 - to owners of rental properties. That's all rental properties, no matter how big or small the property 00:21:21.121 --> 00:21:29.067 - is. Right. You'll hear Reidie refer to them as 2% properties. They are the properties that are subject 00:21:29.067 --> 00:21:34.622 - to the 2% tax stamp. They are residential but not homestead properties. 00:21:35.650 --> 00:21:44.294 - So yes, that is big apartments, small apartments, say individually owned rental houses. But this tax 00:21:44.294 --> 00:21:52.852 - break to owners of these rental properties is a major reason why we're seeing such a large decrease 00:21:52.852 --> 00:22:01.068 - in net assessed value. It looks like Council Member Ralla has a question. Yeah, go ahead, Dave. 00:22:01.068 --> 00:22:03.550 - Thank you. That's harrowing. 00:22:03.778 --> 00:22:12.564 - I wonder to what extent, Jeff, short-term rentals play a part. So the estimate is about 1,000 homes 00:22:12.564 --> 00:22:21.965 - have been converted to short-term rentals in the past years. That has to equal quite a lot of net assessed 00:22:21.965 --> 00:22:31.806 - value, does it not? And is there any estimate of that effect specific to short-term rentals, Airbnbs, so forth? 00:22:32.386 --> 00:22:39.093 - I've not heard, but that's a reasonable calculation to do. I think that would probably rely on information 00:22:39.093 --> 00:22:45.550 - from the assessor's office. I don't know to what degree that they collect information, whether there's 00:22:45.550 --> 00:22:51.881 - anything specific in any database about short-term rentals versus other rentals. They are definitely 00:22:51.881 --> 00:22:58.526 - 2 percent rather than 1 percent. They're not homesteads, so they definitely would have an effect on this. 00:22:58.914 --> 00:23:07.539 - But yeah, we would have to somehow marry a list of short-term rentals with the information from the 00:23:07.539 --> 00:23:16.164 - auditor and assessor's office. But that's certainly something interesting and worth, I think, worth 00:23:16.164 --> 00:23:25.047 - calculating. I think so. Thank you. Thank you. Next. OK, so this is kind of the last one. This is also 00:23:25.047 --> 00:23:26.686 - a follow-on to the 00:23:27.202 --> 00:23:33.131 - the issue that I just talked about with the net assessed value is, and this literally happened this 00:23:33.131 --> 00:23:39.119 - morning. So as I was reading and looking at websites, I realized that this new information, which is 00:23:39.119 --> 00:23:45.107 - the circuit breaker estimates for 2020 set just came out this morning. And so I haven't had a chance 00:23:45.107 --> 00:23:51.392 - to do any analysis, but I did want to just kind of give you the top line number and I've got it projected 00:23:51.392 --> 00:23:54.238 - up on the screen here. So what we're seeing is, 00:23:54.946 --> 00:24:06.017 - Can you make it bigger? I make it bigger. How's that? That's much better. OK. And so the key piece of 00:24:06.017 --> 00:24:17.089 - information here is the 2027 estimate from the DLGF. Again, this is just an estimate, but this is the 00:24:17.089 --> 00:24:23.710 - number that ultimately will go into the advertising budgets. 00:24:24.130 --> 00:24:32.833 - And what we're seeing is a hit of 1.3 million from the circuit breaker. This is the tax caps. This is 00:24:32.833 --> 00:24:41.706 - an increase of 7%. Or if you look at those numbers there, almost a million dollars in property tax loss 00:24:41.706 --> 00:24:50.409 - to the city from the circuit breakers compared to 2026. Now you'll see that the big SEA 1 hit is this 00:24:50.409 --> 00:24:53.566 - year. We've already kind of digested 00:24:53.922 --> 00:25:03.460 - part of the largest impact of the SCA1 where we saw a circuit breaker increase of 626% from 171,000 00:25:03.460 --> 00:25:13.474 - to 1.2 million. But again, as we see this assessed value, and it's all related because when net assessed 00:25:13.474 --> 00:25:23.870 - value decreases, property tax rates increase for the same amount of money. When property tax rates increase, 00:25:24.162 --> 00:25:31.319 - circuit breaker, tax caps, loss, increase. So that's the kind of chain of causality here. And so that's 00:25:31.319 --> 00:25:38.407 - what we're seeing. Again, late breaking news, none of it good. And the lit information's good, but the 00:25:38.407 --> 00:25:45.358 - property tax information's bad. And this is a direct result of, you know, this is not local economy. 00:25:45.358 --> 00:25:52.446 - This is a direct result of SEO 1.0, SEO 1.0 situation. So that's all I had. And I know it was a little 00:25:52.446 --> 00:25:53.822 - longer during that. 00:25:54.178 --> 00:26:01.809 - I think that that's okay. And I'll continue as to bring to you any new information that we receive so 00:26:01.809 --> 00:26:09.515 - that, you know, by the time we actually start talking about the budget, we're kind of working with the 00:26:09.515 --> 00:26:16.997 - most recent and most accurate information. If you could kind of assemble these things into a one or 00:26:16.997 --> 00:26:24.030 - two page whatever and add it into the fiscal committee folder, the shared one, so that we can 00:26:24.130 --> 00:26:32.239 - post that as a packet that's in them. I can do that. I saw that. I kind of had some notes. Yeah. Yeah, 00:26:32.239 --> 00:26:40.585 - I saw that. So I was kind of like, oh, hopefully it'll be easy for him to just put that in a quick little 00:26:40.585 --> 00:26:47.986 - one-pager just so that we can have those links and have them made publicly available as well. 00:26:47.986 --> 00:26:53.182 - We'll do. Any other questions or comments for the controller? OK. 00:26:53.954 --> 00:27:06.472 - Let's move on to review of the compensation framework and the elected official salary stuff. And now 00:27:06.472 --> 00:27:17.502 - I'm going to work on sharing my screen, hopefully. One thing that I want to share first. 00:27:29.442 --> 00:27:41.067 - So last time we talked about this, I hope it's this one. I hope that's right. Perfect. So last time 00:27:41.067 --> 00:27:52.808 - we talked about this, Dave, I don't think that you were here. And so Isabel and Matt and I discussed 00:27:52.808 --> 00:27:57.342 - the updated kind of guiding principles 00:27:57.666 --> 00:28:05.755 - that they had worked on modifying and so the first thing I wanted to do was kind of review this piece 00:28:05.755 --> 00:28:14.002 - of and my recollection at the time was that I thought that this was good and you guys obviously created 00:28:14.002 --> 00:28:21.694 - it and you thought that it was good and I don't remember there being things that we specifically 00:28:23.074 --> 00:28:29.755 - about changing. So Dave, I'm especially interested in your feedback on these updated guiding principles. 00:28:29.755 --> 00:28:36.182 - So values to guide how we make decisions, accessibility to public service. So compensation makes the 00:28:36.182 --> 00:28:42.163 - office attainable for community members. There's equitable pay according to respective levels 00:28:42.163 --> 00:28:48.716 - of responsibility relative to other Bloomington elected officials and departmental leadership. Quality 00:28:48.716 --> 00:28:51.198 - customer service or community service. 00:28:51.490 --> 00:29:01.072 - enables the elected officials to meaningfully engage and serve the community, informed decisions, allows 00:29:01.072 --> 00:29:10.381 - us to make informed decisions. Oh wait, those were the original ones. Then transparent and documented 00:29:10.381 --> 00:29:19.781 - process. That shifted to three values, accessibility of public service, quality community service, and 00:29:19.781 --> 00:29:21.150 - equitable pay. 00:29:21.954 --> 00:29:32.606 - two processes, informed decisions about the elected official compensation, and then transparency and 00:29:32.606 --> 00:29:43.679 - consistency of process. Now that we all remember this, are there updated comments about it? Dave, you're 00:29:43.679 --> 00:29:49.374 - unmuted, so why don't you go first? I'm in agreement. 00:29:51.842 --> 00:30:03.762 - that the new version looks good? Yes. Great. And we decided that last time. Can we vote? We could. Sure. 00:30:03.762 --> 00:30:15.227 - So I will take a motion then. I move that we approve the new guiding principles for setting elective 00:30:15.227 --> 00:30:20.222 - potential sounds. Is there a second? Great. 00:30:20.930 --> 00:30:29.333 - There's motion a second to approve this new tax. And actually, should we approve it or should we recommend 00:30:29.333 --> 00:30:37.186 - it to the full council for approval? Or should we? I don't think the full council ever voted on it. 00:30:37.186 --> 00:30:45.118 - No, they didn't. No, they didn't. All right. We could recommend it for approval by the council also. 00:30:45.570 --> 00:30:51.631 - The idea is that it's this body's guiding principles to make a recommendation on the actual figures 00:30:51.631 --> 00:30:58.115 - that are being updated. And it could also maybe go along with the rest of, because if we recall correctly, 00:30:58.115 --> 00:31:04.661 - there's like additional guidance on how to actually set this. And so these are just the guiding principles. 00:31:04.661 --> 00:31:11.085 - So I think that this motion should stand, and then maybe we should bring the whole package to the council 00:31:11.085 --> 00:31:14.782 - for a whole approval. Does that work? All right, let's vote. 00:31:15.810 --> 00:31:26.919 - Isabel? Yes. Matt? Yes. Dave? Yes. And I'll vote yes, too. Wonderful. OK. Got them. The next piece of 00:31:26.919 --> 00:31:37.810 - this was the elected official was the comparisons. And so actually, this is where I'm going to stop 00:31:37.810 --> 00:31:43.582 - the share, and I'm going to start a different share. 00:31:52.130 --> 00:32:12.000 - This was where Dave and I sat down and we had trimmed down the list of salaries to, this is actually 00:32:12.000 --> 00:32:14.558 - what I want. 00:32:15.010 --> 00:32:25.203 - to just a few cities. And instead of taking all of the second-class cities in Indiana, we had specifically 00:32:25.203 --> 00:32:35.110 - picked out ones that were maybe of more comparison value to LaMita. And then we had also collected some 00:32:35.110 --> 00:32:44.446 - other potential comparison entities that were outside of Monroe County and or outside of Indiana. 00:32:45.250 --> 00:32:53.903 - and other, you know, like Alexville is on here at the town council. So they're a little bit different, 00:32:53.903 --> 00:33:02.304 - like a different body and the Indiana state representatives and senators. And so I did a little bit 00:33:02.304 --> 00:33:11.042 - of that and updated the sheet. Dave, do you have any updates that just haven't gone onto the sheet yet? 00:33:11.042 --> 00:33:13.982 - Yes. I completed my assignment for 00:33:14.114 --> 00:33:27.560 - Mayor and Council on the Google Doc. Is that updated on the Google Doc now? Should be. Are all of these 00:33:27.560 --> 00:33:40.489 - numbers updated then here? Yes. Excellent. But you didn't update the sources? I did not. That's why 00:33:40.489 --> 00:33:42.558 - I was confused. 00:33:43.010 --> 00:33:54.201 - But I did make a number of calls to verify the amount. OK. So I can safely delete everything from this 00:33:54.201 --> 00:34:05.067 - master list from the purple ones? Yeah. Great. And did you put any notes in here about any of them? 00:34:05.067 --> 00:34:09.630 - Or can I delete the notes too? I did not. 00:34:11.042 --> 00:34:19.025 - And I did not complete the number of meetings, et cetera. So I have to do that. OK. So we've still got 00:34:19.025 --> 00:34:27.008 - a little bit more work to do on the sheet. But this, at least, is a little bit updated. And so you can 00:34:27.008 --> 00:34:35.068 - see, I sent out some emails. I've got some outstanding things. These sources are not valid on the green 00:34:35.068 --> 00:34:39.486 - ones, unless these numbers have also been filled in. OK. 00:34:41.346 --> 00:34:49.673 - Then the rest of this document, which is also partially filled in, is the number of regular meetings 00:34:49.673 --> 00:34:57.918 - per year, and I tried to average the last three years, the number of council committees, the number 00:34:57.918 --> 00:35:07.070 - of other appointments, and then just dividing pay by meeting, and then pay by meeting plus other appointments. 00:35:07.490 --> 00:35:15.224 - This is where I would say any analysis gets a little bit dubious. We can absolutely have a discussion 00:35:15.224 --> 00:35:22.959 - of how we want to analyze this stuff and what we want to really do with this information and what the 00:35:22.959 --> 00:35:30.845 - relevance is. I suppose you could say in terms of things like council committees and other appointments 00:35:30.845 --> 00:35:37.214 - because there's nothing in here about how frequently council committees meet or how 00:35:37.570 --> 00:35:49.798 - long they meet for and similarly with other appointments. Are the other appointments monthly? So dividing 00:35:49.798 --> 00:36:01.450 - it essentially adds one meeting per year, I think. So I'm not sure how relevant that is, and I would 00:36:01.450 --> 00:36:06.526 - take feedback on that. So the purple stuff, 00:36:07.522 --> 00:36:16.143 - from Dave is not in your packet of information. It is just up on the screen at this point. 00:36:16.143 --> 00:36:25.617 - And once again, which is kind of the way it was in 2024, there is quite a variation here in council 00:36:25.617 --> 00:36:35.564 - member pay. It looks like the low right now is Muncie at 14,000. Oh no, the low is green. It's Greenwood 00:36:35.564 --> 00:36:36.606 - at 12,000. 00:36:37.474 --> 00:36:47.868 - And then the high at least that has been recorded is that 28,000 Lafayette, it looks like. And Dave, 00:36:47.868 --> 00:36:58.160 - do you have the information about number of meetings and you just kind of added it in yet or do you 00:36:58.160 --> 00:37:07.422 - not have that information? You're muted. Yeah, sorry about that. I did not add it in yet. 00:37:07.650 --> 00:37:17.172 - I've got a couple, but I don't have accessible at this moment. Um, so I, I need to, yeah, sorry about 00:37:17.172 --> 00:37:26.695 - that morning, but I ran out of time. Um, and by the way, the West Lafayette number is tentative. They 00:37:26.695 --> 00:37:34.910 - just passed an ordinance, uh, last week, but it wasn't, it hasn't come into effect yet. 00:37:36.482 --> 00:37:47.570 - Okay, so they passed one for increases for next year, for 20.7? Yeah, they just did their salary ordinances. 00:37:47.570 --> 00:37:57.844 - They just revised them. Okay. Great, I'll add that in as a note. So it would be interesting to know, 00:37:57.844 --> 00:38:05.982 - especially because they are amongst the lowest, whether they are changing that. 00:38:06.082 --> 00:38:15.161 - So sorry. So Dave is the 16,209 for West Lafayette. Is that for 2026 or 2027? Uh, 2027. Wow. Oh wait, 00:38:15.161 --> 00:38:24.419 - the 16,000 is 2027 is next year for West Lafayette? Um, they just passed the ordinance literally a week 00:38:24.419 --> 00:38:33.854 - ago. Right. I believe it's effective next year. I don't think it's effective this year. I think it's the, 00:38:35.074 --> 00:38:43.742 - Because they're just setting their salaries for next year, as I believe. All right. So that's their 00:38:43.742 --> 00:38:52.497 - 27 number. All right. One of the things that I find interesting is that there were a couple of clerk 00:38:52.497 --> 00:39:01.425 - salaries up here that I think have been increased in Evansville and Fort Wayne. But it looks like some 00:39:01.425 --> 00:39:04.286 - of the other ones have not been. 00:39:04.450 --> 00:39:12.731 - And of course, salaries are all over the place. And I don't know if we want to do any kind of comparison 00:39:12.731 --> 00:39:21.092 - based on population, because that can certainly go into this chart. I don't know at this point how useful 00:39:21.092 --> 00:39:29.294 - it is to do this comparison versus how much we need to just sort of assess. I mean, our controller just 00:39:29.294 --> 00:39:33.790 - gave us, I would say, more bad news than good news about 00:39:34.402 --> 00:39:44.703 - future revenues. So they all want to do. Well, I think the. This doesn't directly answer your question, 00:39:44.703 --> 00:39:54.707 - but just to give feedback on this chart, I think the number of. House committees and number of other 00:39:54.707 --> 00:40:02.334 - appointments and the pay for meeting plus other appointments is not. Doesn't 00:40:03.650 --> 00:40:11.586 - Maybe we can, maybe the number of regular meetings is relevant. I wouldn't even do the pay-per-meet. 00:40:11.586 --> 00:40:19.758 - I just don't think those other things can be compared as apples to apples. Like you said, we don't know 00:40:19.758 --> 00:40:27.615 - these other appointments if it's just once twice a year or if it's twice a week. We don't know what 00:40:27.615 --> 00:40:32.094 - the duties are. There's a false sense of accuracy. Yeah. 00:40:33.442 --> 00:40:42.303 - And the, I'm curious for Lovington, number of regular meetings for year 39? That was the average of 00:40:42.303 --> 00:40:51.253 - the last three years. That, that included the budget hearings? Yeah, that included all of, I'll say, 00:40:51.253 --> 00:41:00.114 - the regularly scheduled full council meetings. So it was like, so our regular sessions, our special 00:41:00.114 --> 00:41:03.038 - sessions, like what we approved, 00:41:03.426 --> 00:41:09.313 - in like November or December. Okay, because you said regular meetings, so I thought regular sessions, 00:41:09.313 --> 00:41:15.259 - which would have been good. Right, no, like the things that are scheduled at the beginning of the year 00:41:15.259 --> 00:41:21.088 - that we put on our calendars that we expect that we're going to actually have, so it doesn't include 00:41:21.088 --> 00:41:26.110 - anything that might kind of come up as an emergency session or an executive session or 00:41:26.498 --> 00:41:35.655 - We had an executive session this week, it wouldn't have included that. From the other cities also, it 00:41:35.655 --> 00:41:44.812 - was like their annual count. That's what I asked them for, yes. What's four more? It's only four more 00:41:44.812 --> 00:41:54.238 - than us. Yeah, it's only four more than us. What are we doing? Some of the other ones specifically said, 00:41:54.626 --> 00:42:03.051 - Like Evansville, for example, they meet twice a month. And with no brain, I guess they're really reliable 00:42:03.051 --> 00:42:11.159 - about it. But then when I clarified, I also wanted things like the budget guarantee. Oh, add three to 00:42:11.159 --> 00:42:17.438 - that then. And that's apparently they only have three budget related sessions. 00:42:18.082 --> 00:42:25.171 - didn't ask things like legislation or, you know, any of those sorts of expectations, like how much in 00:42:25.171 --> 00:42:32.121 - the weeds it's really worth getting, probably not at the time. Yeah, just Hopi, since you mentioned 00:42:32.121 --> 00:42:39.349 - it, I do think population is relevant. I mean, there are a lot of facets to determining salary in terms 00:42:39.349 --> 00:42:46.786 - of responsibilities, such as number of meeting committees and so forth, but population, I mean, it really, 00:42:46.786 --> 00:42:47.550 - obviously, 00:42:48.034 --> 00:42:56.337 - is going to affect the number of constituents and constituent input that you're going to hear 00:42:56.337 --> 00:43:05.169 - as a representative. I think it's also a good proxy for economic activity and development proposals 00:43:05.169 --> 00:43:14.267 - and things like that, the population number. Anyway, I just wanted to add that. Okay. Maybe doing some 00:43:14.267 --> 00:43:17.182 - calculation based on population. 00:43:17.986 --> 00:43:26.816 - should probably factor in to some degree. Yeah. Thank you. Matt. Yeah, I think, you know, I appreciate 00:43:26.816 --> 00:43:35.389 - having the data. I think it's difficult to parse. And my broader concern has always been that there 00:43:35.389 --> 00:43:42.590 - are systemic inequities that, in fact, not only in Bloomington but other places do. 00:43:42.914 --> 00:43:50.579 - And so simply looking to a bunch of systemic inequities to validate our own graduation in the same is 00:43:50.579 --> 00:43:58.170 - not like a sound approach. I don't mind it as a contextual consideration to look at. I think it does 00:43:58.170 --> 00:44:05.985 - help when we add some of these details, population, number of meetings, et cetera, to better understand 00:44:05.985 --> 00:44:08.766 - that context. What I've always found 00:44:10.146 --> 00:44:17.011 - relatively compelling as a basic way to look at things is the ratio of a full-time mayor to a part-time 00:44:17.011 --> 00:44:23.085 - legislator, you know, salary as well. And just doing some, like, basic searching for, like, 00:44:23.085 --> 00:44:29.818 - state legislatures as an example, which is also very widely, right? Some have very short sessions and 00:44:29.818 --> 00:44:36.617 - some have very long sessions. A three-to-one or a four-to-one ratio from the executive to the governor 00:44:36.617 --> 00:44:39.390 - to state legislators is pretty difficult. 00:44:40.258 --> 00:44:45.986 - Um, that's layers based salaries, usually lower, but most states have prevailed things around the number 00:44:45.986 --> 00:44:51.605 - of days or in section, things like that. And when it's all said and done, the typical range across the 00:44:51.605 --> 00:44:57.225 - country seems to be about three to one or four at one for governors to get legislators. That's a ratio 00:44:57.225 --> 00:45:02.735 - that we talked about in the context of Bloomington where, um, you know, based on the, the, the input 00:45:02.735 --> 00:45:08.190 - from current nine council members about not just their own service, but what they believe it takes. 00:45:08.514 --> 00:45:15.376 - to provide quality service, you know, as an elected official, as an elected council member, I believe 00:45:15.376 --> 00:45:22.171 - it was 12 or 14 hours, something like that was the average, you know, answer. That's, you know, that 00:45:22.171 --> 00:45:28.966 - has limitations to a number I feel very comfortable with as conservative is, you know, quarter time, 00:45:28.966 --> 00:45:36.030 - essentially, quarter time service. And if the mayor is full-time service, that's a ratio of four to one. 00:45:37.122 --> 00:45:41.718 - Of course, I know there's other ways to think about this, including the fact that there are nine city 00:45:41.718 --> 00:45:46.359 - council members. So when you think about them the same way, you know, on and on and on, the others are 00:45:46.359 --> 00:45:51.091 - always thinking about this. I think that's a reasonable ratio. And I think analyzing the ratios to these 00:45:51.091 --> 00:45:55.867 - other cities can also be helpful. There are some that are like wildly out of whack, you know, in a sense, 00:45:55.867 --> 00:46:00.463 - like I think, you know, the Greenwood ratio is like pretty extreme, but I think their council is also 00:46:00.463 --> 00:46:04.158 - like a pretty lean body. It doesn't do a lot of fog council members there before. 00:46:04.418 --> 00:46:10.760 - Their meetings are short. They have no committees. They only have regular sessions, right? You know, 00:46:10.760 --> 00:46:17.040 - they just, you know, really, really lose their business. And I'd be deferential with the executive. 00:46:17.040 --> 00:46:23.319 - That's just not how things are. I've been for a long time in Bloomington. No, I think our residents 00:46:23.319 --> 00:46:29.850 - generally want things to be. So, you know, I guess my broader point here is that the values and process 00:46:29.850 --> 00:46:32.990 - we updated are all well and good. There's enough. 00:46:33.250 --> 00:46:41.937 - wiggle room in them for any of us to read pretty much any range of answers we want to into it. So the 00:46:41.937 --> 00:46:50.540 - values are great. It at least gives us some basis to explain how we're thinking about this decision. 00:46:50.540 --> 00:46:59.312 - But it doesn't give us a very objective way to write a number instead of trying to subject it. I still 00:46:59.312 --> 00:47:03.230 - find it feeling something basic like relation 00:47:03.714 --> 00:47:10.790 - setting aside the court salary for this purpose, but set the relation between mayoral salaries and council 00:47:10.790 --> 00:47:17.602 - salaries as a ratio. And I wonder if adding, at least, you know, so that's just how I'm thinking about 00:47:17.602 --> 00:47:24.216 - it, but also I wonder if adding that ratio to the columns of, you know, the columns that, you know, 00:47:24.216 --> 00:47:29.374 - by city that present this data would be another interesting thing to look at. 00:47:30.306 --> 00:47:37.489 - and consider how, you know, where the shoes are. But again, with the caveat that I don't think that 00:47:37.489 --> 00:47:44.888 - I probably could assume that it's all that useful. Yeah. I mean, I do have these percentages over here 00:47:44.888 --> 00:47:52.719 - that I filled in. Yeah. Because I wasn't sure where we wanted to do that. And so, yeah. That's my long-ended 00:47:52.719 --> 00:47:59.902 - endorsement of doing that, yes. OK. I can do that. Dave? Yes, I think it's an interesting proposal. 00:48:00.002 --> 00:48:07.125 - I'd like to think about that in terms of ratio because that would be then predictable and maybe it would 00:48:07.125 --> 00:48:14.044 - be a good check relative to the mayor's salary and the council's salary too, unless of course there's 00:48:14.044 --> 00:48:20.827 - collusion between the two bodies. But generally speaking, I think that that does make sense to have 00:48:20.827 --> 00:48:27.814 - a ratio kind of approach. And I just wanted to note that it looks like I think Terre Haute and Hammond 00:48:27.814 --> 00:48:29.374 - are about four to one. 00:48:29.890 --> 00:48:38.129 - in terms of the ratio, if I'm not mistaken, between the mayor and the council. So, you know, there is, 00:48:38.129 --> 00:48:46.287 - there are examples. I mean, I'm not saying that they're explicitly, you know, aiming for that, but it 00:48:46.287 --> 00:48:53.086 - just kind of falls within that range. That's all. Thanks. And what about the clerks? 00:48:54.242 --> 00:49:00.826 - Yeah, Dave, did you just not get to putting the clerk's salary for these other places on there on the 00:49:00.826 --> 00:49:07.410 - chart yet? Yeah, I haven't. Yes. Yes. I'm sorry. I'm tardy. That's all right. We'll get this updated. 00:49:07.410 --> 00:49:13.930 - I'll just briefly follow up. I didn't really mention it. I don't tend to think of the clerk's salary 00:49:13.930 --> 00:49:20.643 - in the same way with respect to a ratio to the others. I tend to think about it more like I think about 00:49:20.643 --> 00:49:23.806 - the head of the council office, which is running 00:49:23.970 --> 00:49:29.945 - running a city department, keeping it a small one. We have a number of small city departments. So I 00:49:29.945 --> 00:49:35.920 - think there are limits to that approach as well. And yeah, there has been an allergy, but that's, I 00:49:35.920 --> 00:49:42.075 - think it's more in that direction than the ratio of other realtor. Great. I want to note that the time 00:49:42.075 --> 00:49:48.229 - is 9.22, and I want to have a public comment on this. And Port Bolden also walked in on the limit, and 00:49:48.229 --> 00:49:52.830 - I want to give her an opportunity at all to say anything about salary stuff. 00:49:53.698 --> 00:50:00.183 - want to comment on this? Just really quickly because I was coming up to whisper in Colleen's ear and 00:50:00.183 --> 00:50:06.795 - ask Dave and listen to this. So sorry, I'm glad I did because I actually had questions and she had the 00:50:06.795 --> 00:50:13.344 - answers on our spreadsheets. When I gave you guys salary information, what, two, three years ago, one 00:50:13.344 --> 00:50:20.150 - of the concerns that was expressed by both the administration and a few council members, I think actually 00:50:20.150 --> 00:50:22.782 - Councilmember Rollin who were one of the 00:50:22.978 --> 00:50:28.980 - you wanted to actually have source materials, you wanted them verified, so email them, but it probably 00:50:28.980 --> 00:50:34.807 - wouldn't suffice. My solution was to actually provide you guys with the salary ordinances for those 00:50:34.807 --> 00:50:40.809 - years. So I would strongly suggest if you guys are going back to the council, you actually pull up the 00:50:40.809 --> 00:50:46.811 - 2026 salary ordinances, or if you would like, we can provide them to you, because we do have them. And 00:50:46.811 --> 00:50:48.734 - for all the second class cities, 00:50:49.730 --> 00:50:57.013 - So some of the numbers that you have on your chart just by eyeballing it will be correct, or they may 00:50:57.013 --> 00:51:04.224 - have additional information that wasn't accounted for in a phone call and or email. So I would just, 00:51:04.224 --> 00:51:11.507 - that is my advice, take it however you wish. Councilmember Rallo, I think at one point you would talk 00:51:11.507 --> 00:51:19.646 - about Monroe County salaries versus elected official salaries as well. So that may be something we wanna look at. 00:51:19.970 --> 00:51:27.663 - I'm sorry, there are lots of bills in the state, so not to discount or discredit that, but that would 00:51:27.663 --> 00:51:35.205 - be something that you all might want to consider kind of incorporating because you're talking about 00:51:35.205 --> 00:51:42.823 - comparison of cities where you know they are a town, but that may have some bearing on what you guys 00:51:42.823 --> 00:51:44.030 - are looking at. 00:51:44.322 --> 00:51:55.677 - I haven't had a chance to check in with Elton yet, but I got the Monroe County ones on there. We sat 00:51:55.677 --> 00:52:06.919 - down a while ago, talked about the other comparison cities outside, and we just haven't had time to 00:52:06.919 --> 00:52:12.990 - look at that score. It's already 924. The last thing, 00:52:13.538 --> 00:52:20.102 - I missed my train of thought there. Oh, yes. I appreciate you guys looking at this, and I'm assuming 00:52:20.102 --> 00:52:27.186 - you're talking framework and all that other stuff again. But just to be very, very clear from my perspective 00:52:27.186 --> 00:52:33.881 - for the Office of the City Clerk, I think the polling increase along the lines of the rest of the safe 00:52:33.881 --> 00:52:40.510 - and civil city staff is fine. I do think that you guys should explore this in more depth leading into 00:52:40.674 --> 00:52:48.584 - the next city clerk, the next mayor, the next councilor, so that it's not immediately set in, we're 00:52:48.584 --> 00:52:56.652 - raising our own salaries, but we're looking ahead for the future. All right. Oh, that may be. As long 00:52:56.652 --> 00:53:04.958 - as the peace builder doesn't blame you for saying that. All right, thank you. Anything else? No, I mean, 00:53:05.282 --> 00:53:11.963 - I think that most of this, I didn't invite you, we talked about this a little bit and I didn't specifically 00:53:11.963 --> 00:53:18.520 - say like, hey, come to this one, because I figured that we would mostly be talking about council salaries 00:53:18.520 --> 00:53:24.767 - in terms of some of the stuff that we've talked about before, but probably in September we'll have a 00:53:24.767 --> 00:53:31.386 - conversation that we'll want to invite you to as well. In terms of giving feedback on, maybe even October, 00:53:31.386 --> 00:53:34.974 - honestly, as far as saying we'll have to chat about that. 00:53:35.650 --> 00:53:43.809 - So all right, I want to make sure to get to public comments about this because I said that we would 00:53:43.809 --> 00:53:51.968 - have public comment here. So there are no members of the public in the room. If there's any members 00:53:51.968 --> 00:54:00.453 - of the public on Zoom, if you could please raise your hand using the raised hand feature. I'll go ahead 00:54:00.453 --> 00:54:03.390 - and stop the screen share and I see 00:54:04.002 --> 00:54:12.967 - K. R. K. C. P. is that has raised their hands. Um, and I'll go ahead and set my timer for about three 00:54:12.967 --> 00:54:20.350 - minutes. Um, and can you hear me? Yup. We can hear you. Go ahead. Kevin Keough. Um, 00:54:20.738 --> 00:54:27.431 - First, I want to acknowledge Jeff. He's been accessible and responds, and that's greatly appreciated. 00:54:27.431 --> 00:54:34.255 - The budget book released date 126. This is my enumeration so far. I'm searching for a methodology. This 00:54:34.255 --> 00:54:40.883 - is my starting point. But my first objective was to enumerate the general fund comparison on page 12 00:54:40.883 --> 00:54:47.838 - and trace it to the ACFR. Initial observation was that revenue and expenditures 2023, 2024 did not match. 00:54:48.130 --> 00:54:54.438 - completed a worksheet, sent it to Jeff at City Controller. Answer, the comparison combines the general 00:54:54.438 --> 00:55:00.808 - fund, the rainy day fund, and the payroll clearing account fund. This shows the nuance of some of these 00:55:00.808 --> 00:55:06.933 - descriptors. The more disclosures made, the better it is for the public, that's one point that. But 00:55:06.933 --> 00:55:11.710 - the finding I came away with is, I need to use the AFR reports, not the ACFR. 00:55:11.810 --> 00:55:18.190 - I found the AFR reports are static cash basis reports as of 228 for the prior fiscal year. They do not 00:55:18.190 --> 00:55:24.755 - change. There's no further adjustments made. If a correction is needed, a completely new AFR is submitted 00:55:24.755 --> 00:55:31.135 - and dated. This is a significant finding. It needs to be expanded and I need to look into it more, but 00:55:31.135 --> 00:55:35.966 - it really gets to the quality, integrity, and accuracy, and the completeness. 00:55:36.034 --> 00:55:42.352 - is not at this time. Finding two was the fund numbers changed into 2025 AFR. I have no idea 00:55:42.352 --> 00:55:49.494 - of the significance of this. Again, maybe at a later time we can discuss or whatever. The payroll count 00:55:49.494 --> 00:55:56.362 - though, I think it's account 904, it had a change in accounting principle for fiscal years 2023 and 00:55:56.362 --> 00:55:57.598 - 2024. I get words 00:55:57.794 --> 00:56:04.583 - further enumeration at a later time, brings up the issue of fund transfers and inflating revenues and 00:56:04.583 --> 00:56:11.371 - expenses. I think this is very significant and really just warrants some discussion. The budget book, 00:56:11.371 --> 00:56:18.227 - the Appendix A, does not include the beginning or the ending fund balance, which should equal the cash 00:56:18.227 --> 00:56:19.358 - and investments. 00:56:19.618 --> 00:56:26.741 - It's disclosed in the AFR. I think it's significant. I think it's good information. If you're going 00:56:26.741 --> 00:56:34.292 - to include in which the appendix is quite lengthy, that would be some information that I think the public 00:56:34.292 --> 00:56:41.416 - would find important. Also, this started a new objective because I started looking at that appendix 00:56:41.416 --> 00:56:46.046 - and I compared it to the AFR listing of fund balances and funds. 00:56:46.882 --> 00:56:53.610 - It seems to be there's some missing funds in the appendix. I've started preparing a list. I'm not clear 00:56:53.610 --> 00:57:00.273 - on why certain funds are not included in that appendix, and I really can't determine the significance, 00:57:00.273 --> 00:57:06.936 - but I think it warrants some further enumeration. I need to know a little bit more. I think the public 00:57:06.936 --> 00:57:13.470 - would, you know, why some funds that are listed in AFR aren't listed in that appendix. Overall, just 00:57:13.762 --> 00:57:20.640 - just to figure out how all these funds work. I've seen in other municipalities where they have a flow 00:57:20.640 --> 00:57:27.654 - chart and they talk about the funds and how the funds interact and the significance, you know, and I've 00:57:27.654 --> 00:57:35.004 - had plenty of experience with fund accounting and I know the importance of restricted funds and unrestricted 00:57:35.004 --> 00:57:40.062 - and always- Mr. Kiel, that was three minutes. All right, that's all I get. 00:57:40.258 --> 00:57:48.628 - I just want to encourage the public to look at this, but there's a lot here and it's not easy to digest 00:57:48.628 --> 00:57:56.918 - all this. That's just to give you an idea how difficult it is. Anyway, I know I've got to shut up now. 00:57:56.918 --> 00:58:04.967 - Thank you. If you have other comments about that specificity, I'm sure that those things in writing 00:58:04.967 --> 00:58:08.830 - would be easiest for the controller to look at. 00:58:09.954 --> 00:58:21.083 - Yeah. Are there other public comments? I didn't see anybody else's hand raised and once going twice, 00:58:21.083 --> 00:58:32.212 - we're gone. Coming back to the meeting, we talked a little bit about where we go from here and it is 00:58:32.212 --> 00:58:35.518 - 931, so I want to adjourn us. 00:58:36.962 --> 00:58:44.077 - We do not have another fiscal committee meeting until September. In terms of our rotation, we would 00:58:44.077 --> 00:58:51.335 - expect to be hearing something from the administration on the floor. We'll have to talk about whether 00:58:51.335 --> 00:58:58.593 - that makes the most sense because we'll be coming right off of the budget presentations at that time. 00:58:58.593 --> 00:59:00.158 - We'll have to decide. 00:59:00.386 --> 00:59:07.541 - Welcome feedback from my colleagues about whether there's something that you would appreciate hearing 00:59:07.541 --> 00:59:14.976 - from the administration, maybe specifically related to the budget presentations and any of those concerns 00:59:14.976 --> 00:59:17.150 - at the beginning of September. 00:59:17.474 --> 00:59:23.927 - could potentially be useful to continue talking about elected salary stuff and to go back again to that 00:59:23.927 --> 00:59:30.317 - original framework because some of the things in terms of the comparison cities versus the percentages 00:59:30.317 --> 00:59:36.770 - of, or like the ratios, that kind of reminds me of some of the conversations that we had the first time 00:59:36.770 --> 00:59:42.974 - around this, around the basis of salary setting and what kind of basis are we going to use. And so, 00:59:43.074 --> 00:59:50.246 - might be worth revisiting exactly the original form, the whole thing, and going down the next step of 00:59:50.246 --> 00:59:57.417 - that and doing that sooner rather than later on be useful. Well, it might be a good opportunity since 00:59:57.417 --> 01:00:04.448 - we will be coming out of the budget hearings to give some feedback on the presentation, both in the 01:00:04.448 --> 01:00:10.846 - budget book and during the hearings and what worked well and what maybe could be adjusted. 01:00:11.938 --> 01:00:25.266 - That is true, too. So yeah, I guess that's also good feedback. So we will have to figure that out. And 01:00:25.266 --> 01:00:38.206 - I'll put some notes on September 4. So elected salaries, budget presentation feedback, or just kind 01:00:38.206 --> 01:00:41.182 - of delving deeper into 01:00:41.314 --> 01:00:51.116 - specific budgets, concerns, slash issues. Any other thoughts at the top of anybody's brain about that 01:00:51.116 --> 01:01:01.303 - September 4th meeting? All right. Then similarly, in this calendar memo at the end, I'm trying to collect 01:01:01.303 --> 01:01:07.646 - those dates so that then we can know when to do things. I do have 01:01:08.322 --> 01:01:14.941 - the budget hearings on there and the introduction and then adoption of budget legislation and then carrying 01:01:14.941 --> 01:01:21.193 - into next week. We don't have time for this right now, but my little paragraph at the bottom, we have 01:01:21.193 --> 01:01:27.628 - discussed having some kind of a budget fair to present financial data into the public in more accessible 01:01:27.628 --> 01:01:34.370 - ways. We can maybe be thinking about that as we go through these budget hearings and that would be excellent. 01:01:34.370 --> 01:01:35.902 - Any other last comments? 01:01:36.514 --> 01:01:45.753 - I love the idea of budget fare. Yeah. I mean, I love it too. And I think that we just have to figure 01:01:45.753 --> 01:01:55.266 - out the details of when it would make sense to do it and how it would be done. We good? I mean, I think 01:01:55.266 --> 01:02:04.596 - we do need to touch base again on the base question. Yes. Yes. And that might actually. I had an idea 01:02:04.596 --> 01:02:05.694 - about that. 01:02:05.954 --> 01:02:10.843 - We were talking about it earlier in the year. I'm especially interested in this and like a framework 01:02:10.843 --> 01:02:15.780 - for like what it would actually entail to do that. It would probably take multiple years to implement 01:02:15.780 --> 01:02:20.863 - changes to be able to establish shared outcomes in many areas where we don't have them currently, right? 01:02:20.863 --> 01:02:25.801 - Along with the kind of uniform approach, setting metrics that are actually systematically measurable. 01:02:25.801 --> 01:02:30.786 - It could easily be a budget, you know, or related reporting. It's a lot for any, for staff to take on. 01:02:30.786 --> 01:02:34.078 - It's a lot for the internet community to take on. I wonder about a, 01:02:34.178 --> 01:02:41.937 - O'Neill graduate student capstone class. It seems like a really good project, actually, for the public 01:02:41.937 --> 01:02:50.223 - affairs folks. So we've had capstones, most recently, looking at deparmentization efforts with the Commission 01:02:50.223 --> 01:02:57.981 - on Sustainability, leading one. There have been other capstones in the city before, and that could be, 01:02:57.981 --> 01:03:04.158 - it's something to consider, where to help get capacity on project purpose. Great. 01:03:05.346 --> 01:03:14.910 - mentioned to be training things that we forgot about. I was about to adjourn so now we're adjourned.