Mauston Common Council Discusses Budget Items at Work Session
The Mauston Common Council held a budget work session on Tuesday night. City Administrator Nathan Thiel outlined several revenue and expenditure changes.
With revenue, the city qualified for “Expenditure restraint”, which equals $80,000, said Thiel, and the city had an increase in transportation aid. Thiel said based on last year’s budget, there was a reduction to some fines.
In expenditure changes, right now, Thiel said, they are proposing a wage increase of $15,000. Also, Thiel said the annual ambulance contribution is up about $40,000, the property/workers compensation insurance increased about $20,000, and there was an increase in the debt service about $20,000.
Then, Thiel discussed some possible revenue and expenditure considerations. The first with revenue was the ambulance fee. With the ambulance fee revenue, the city has reflected the ambulance fee on the water bill and if they were to maintain this practice next year’s new ambulance rate will increase, and the ambulance rate is scheduled another $40,000 in 2019. There was also the possibility of adjusting the Room Tax Calculation. Thiel also mentioned the option of a vehicle wheel tax. If each vehicle registered to the city were charged $10, the city could anticipate $60,000 in additional revenue.
In the expenditure considerations, it was discussed about moving the hydrant rental payment from the tax levy to the water bill. Thiel said by
removing this expense from the general fund, the city would not only free tax levy, it could reduce total expenditures and assist the city in meeting the expenditure restraint program. It would require a PSC rate study. As a compromise, Thiel said this shift could also be tied to eliminating the Ambulance Fee on the water bill. However, that fee would be moved over the levy to pay for it, but there would still be room in the general fund. Another expenditure consideration, the Mauston/New Lisbon airport requested an additional $1,500. Thiel said it’s been about 20 years since they asked for addition funding, and the county was moving forward with an increase, and New Lisbon possibly would support one if Mauston did.
The council talked about the rising cost of the ambulance fee. Thiel said the ambulance association’s argument was the Mauston had the higher population and higher calls for service, which should be reflected on the city’s rate. Council member Francis McCoy said after this budget process is passed, the city needs to look into what it wants to do in regards to the ambulance rate because the city can’t just keep raising the fee.
No action was taken during the work session, but the council did recommend Thiel to move forward with the ambulance fee, look into the hydrant rental moving over to the water bill, proceed with the room tax calculation and the $1,500 for the airport request.
Later, during the common council meeting, the council approved pay request #3 to A-1 Excavating in the amount of $321,284.82, final change order and pay request to J&J Underground, which adjusted final contract amount to $808,096.99 and final pay request in the amount to $60,010.64, approved the addition of adding $1,500 opt out of a single plan to the Insurance Opt-Out policy, and approved the appointment of Laura Taake as the JC-AIRS City Park Board Representative.
Source: WRJC.com
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