Business matters on the Warsaw City Council’s agenda Monday night were the 2016 budget public hearing and an ordinance amending city code regarding equal access to housing in HUD programs.
The budget estimate for next year totals $27,954,694, an increase of about $3.8 million over the 2015 budget. No members of the public spoke on the 2016 advertised budget during its first reading last night.
“What’s presented here tonight is essentially the first pass at this with very conservative assessed valuation figures, very conservative revenue figures,” Warsaw Mayor Joe Thallemer told the council. “This is just the example of presenting the most conservative approach to this budget that we can, knowing that there will be cuts necessary as we move through this process. Updating the revenue figures, updating the assessed valuation figures and making line one cuts to bring this proposed rate back down to hopefully a pretty flat increase that we had last year.”
Councilwoman Elaine Call asked if they would be able to cut the budget at a later time.
Thallemer responded, “Yeah, we’re asking department heads, and I talked to (Clerk-Treasurer) Lynne (Christiansen) about that today, we’ll ask department heads to submit both line two cuts, which involve 2015 spending, to try and get back what we can on unspent monies in 2015. And then, 2016 spending cuts, we did get our insurance rates back. We planned for a 15 percent increase in our health insurance and we were given a 5 percent increase, so there’s money in that portion of the budget to be returned. There are other areas we looked at.”
He said the city was looking at some savings in its recycling contract, its trash program and potentially some equipment savings.
“So those are things we will go through at our next meeting as line one cuts, and then Lynne mentioned today that we will have more updated revenue and assessed valuation figures built into this and we’ll get a pretty close idea of where we’ll be,” Thallemer said.
Even then, he said it’s just a matter of the council passing the budget and waiting for the Department of Local Government Finance to return the information to them to make final cuts.
The council approved the 2016 budget on first reading, and Ordinance 2015-10-02, which lists the appropriations and tax rates for the initial resolution.
Regarding ordinance 2015-10-01 amending the section of the city code on “equal access to housing in Housing and Urban Development programs,” Thallemer said Kosciusko Coalition on Drug Education is applying for a Community Development Block Grant through the Office of Community and Rural Affairs. The Department of Housing and Urban Development is requiring that local housing ordinances provide full discrimination protection for housing applicants involving HUD funding. The ordinance is a requirement to be eligible for CDBG funding and any housing funding or HUD funding for any housing in the city.
Thallemer said the city also was notified through the Indiana Department of Transportation that all their Local Public Agencies, ordinances and programs that pertain to Title 6 in the near future will have to be similarly updated or risk not being eligible for federal transportation funds.
City attorney Mike Valentine has reviewed the city’s housing ordinance.
“What we’ve done here is added this one sentence to the housing ordinance,” Thallemer said. “It’s an addendum and it pertains only to equal access to housing in HUD programs. So that’s the small change HUD requires for us to apply for that CDBG and be eligible for any Block funding.”
The ordinance states, “Pursuant to 24 CFR Part 5.403 and 24 CFR Part 574.3 the definition of ‘family’ is revised to include families regardless of the actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity or marital status of its members.”
Valentine said it just falls in line with the federal government requirement and it copies their language.
“Other than that, our ordinance seems to track even the model ordinance that was sent to us,” Valentine said.
Councilwoman Diane Quance said the Warsaw Housing Authority has made the change, too.
Aaron Lehman, with WHA and Housing Opportunities of Warsaw, said it’s merely a regulatory request from HUD if “we wish to access their funds.”
The council unanimously approved the ordinance on first and second reading as the grant deadline is Oct. 23.
In other business, the council:
• Heard from Thallemer that they had the six-month stormwater utility financial report and also the investment report in their packet.
Christiansen said there are a couple of investments that are missing from the report.
“I didn’t reinvest them at this time because we’ve been looking at doing our investments in a different manner, so until we make that decision …,” she said.
• Approved the Sept. 21 meeting’s minutes.
(Story By The Times Union)
