City of Biloxi, MS City Council meetings, 1 Sep 2020

Previous Meeting Next Meeting

⏯

youtube image

►

From YouTube: City Council Special Called Budget Meeting Sept 1 2020

Description

The Biloxi City Council held a public hearing on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2020 at 5:15 p.m. at Biloxi City Hall regarding the upcoming budget. To see the agenda, visit:
https://www.biloxi.ms.us/agendas/citycouncil/2020/090120/090120agendaspecreg4.pdf.

A

Welcome to the special meeting called by the mayor, tuesday september 1st 2020, but the agenda is a public hearing regarding the budget. um Do I have a motion.

B

A

I've got a motion by george lawrence, a second by paul tisdale call for the question. All in favor motion carries we'll begin with the mayor's report.

C

uh We have no report we're ready to get to the business of the budget. Summary thank.

A

You, mr mayor council report councilman tisdale councilman lawrence, no.

B

A

Councilman barrett councilman guys councilman glavin.

A

Thank you. I have no report. This will bring us to the public agenda. Lucy.

D

Public hearing to provide the general public with an opportunity to comment on the taxing and spending plan incorporated in the proposed budget of biloxi, mississippi.

A

Thank you lucy, mr mayor, and I want to remind the anybody in the audience that wants to speak regarding the the public hearing and the budget. Our citizens comments have been moved to after the public agenda portion. Mr mayor, okay,.

C

All right, thank you, mr president. I think you have a single sheet. It's my talking paper to talk about the preparation and the point that we come to today uh and it's kind of three sections. uh Actually the top would be uh where we were in 20 and when covet came along, we put the brakes on and if you can look at uh over the left part the general.

C

This is just general fund expenses in revenues and in summaries, but um from the left to right, we've got the number of employees, they're actual employees plus budgeted vacancies and, as you know, uh jumping forward a little bit march came along in april and may we took a significant hit to a lot of things for about 5 million or so in. uh We hope that'll, wind up being about 5 million to gaming revenue and uh sales tax.

C

So, uh looking at where we were and again you see the little note on about 7 20., as I said, we did uh take the opportunity to examine where we were with vacancies and about them. You saw about 100 vacancies, there not 96 vacancies, so uh our uh accounting group and uh mike we uh said. Where are we now with uh personal services, which is about 70 of the ball game as well as what's remaining for fy20?

C

uh So, therefore, we actually developed a schedule to uh reserve about 2.7 million, that's right in the center of the the page, so we reduced the basis for the 21, but was the adjusted basis for 20 for 20 or from 2020 to 21.. So we went from about 65 million down to 63 million in expenses for this year. We're still trying to play to that number.

C

As far as you know, really what we did was eliminate mike jump in anytime, diana or jody. We eliminated about 90 vacancies. That was part of the budget, and we examined where we will need to be as far as 21 and that figure right there with actual employees and vacant employees. That's what we have. This is about the the fourth set of numbers, where it's uh pushing towards the 2021 budget.

E

One of the things if you asked you asked me if you said I could jump in so I will yeah um when, as this was unfolding, we saw one of the options we had would be to furlough or lay off employees, and the mayor wanted to do everything that he could do to avoid that.

E

So we started looking at options. You you're aware that we refinanced the uh the bonds, which was a three over three hundred thousand dollar savings on the year. Okay, we we moved the delivery of the two fire trucks into the next year. We moved the delivery of the bucket truck that had been ordered into the next year, all of which all these payments then got pushed into 2021 and out of 2020..

E

We left all these positions. Vacant, police and fire have been struggling mightily because, as people left, we didn't replace them. So we end up with you know: over 100 vacant positions. Now 50 of those really was 50 plus of those were the summer. We cancelled summer camp for all the kids and it's actually not in the budget this year either.

E

So I mean we were. We were getting a report.

E

My I.t savvy mayor gave us a spreadsheet every week to show us where we were against the ending point, and this was all really being driven by the fact that we knew there were some some options that we had, that we really he didn't want to take.

C

E

Still got a month to go and, and you know we're hoping stuff.

C

Happens again with this budget reflects, you know, we're hopeful of a five million dollar uh loss in revenue. So, if you took you know, if you look at the beginning stuff, then somebody grabbed five million. That would be a big hit and uh that takes us down to the very bottom part of the thing. But let me continue what mike was talking about, so we looked at next year, the 21 year, and so, instead of leaving those vacancies, we actually skinning down what we could actually do.

C

So you know basically, in this budget, we're reflecting in the general fund, 584 actual employees plus 14 exp uh vacancies to be budgeted and that's what uh that's, what that last column, the fy 21 uh 2021 budget. So.

E

That means that means they're going to be still firemen that are vacant positions and when we begin the new year, they'll still be police it'll be vacant positions. When we begin the new year and they'll be public works. Employees that'll be missing when we begin the new year.

C

Well, these vacancies are programmed and and budgeted. So uh with that in mind, uh we're you know we, these numbers, that you see that uh the bottom line of the general fund will be 58, 282 967.

C

In the nine departmental we made some adjustments uh through the budget workshops and and council workshops so that other big part of the uh non-departmental budget is 4.539 million and.

E

For the record, the council added nine ninety thousand dollars to the non-department budget at during the workshops and that money is still in there. Yeah everything you've asked for all the plus ups that you asked for are still in there. It was 90 90, 000 extra.

C

So now the revenue, the expense side of the ball game is programmed there and it's 62 822. any questions. So far, so that's a big part. The biggest part of the the budget is, you know the general fund and uh I think you've got the breakdown on the port and uh water and sewer fund.

C

So again, in the middle of the year we put the brakes on. We reserved about 2.7 million through council workshops we and uh with our directors, to figure out what we need to do in 2021., so that you know that 62 million is, is the expense side of the 2021 budget. Okay, uh if you look go back to the to the left at this point, the revenues back in 2020.. This is again. uh This was also uh considered we're doing what we're doing.

C

We did that at 9 10, I think in september 10th, so what we had forecast the original.

C

Budgeted figures for for expenses was 65 million 177 as opposed to what we're doing this year is 62 822, so we actually reduced the expenses by that amount from this time last year. Looking at this time next year, okay, any questions, so we actually programmed about three million dollars less in expenses for the general fund.

F

I I just want to make one comment, and we made this. I made this comment in our workshops, uh these quarterly payments, that we make, whether it's cta, whether it's the library system or others. They have to know that this is a budgeted number and if our revenues don't match up with our budgeted expenses, those numbers could be cut as well. They cannot depend on that budgeted amount solely if that is declining or, conversely, if cta's expenses are declining and not as high, they should talk to us and we should make adjustments right here.

E

Cta in the library and the taxi cab checkers, those are uh groups that uh bill us as we go through the year. They don't bill us all at one time now when it comes to paying for the golden fisherman.

E

I don't think we've been asked to uh make well.

C

Donations as well as the 25, I think, uh paul, I think we did something we included the 25 additional from that workshop. We had so that's buried in that's actually in this, this 40 4.5 39 million budget.

E

But each one of those uh non-department giveaways or payments will come back to you, each each one to to approve as they go out and if, if the budget doesn't support them, we won't support them and you get a chance to vote it down.

C

Right also part of that 4.5 is 2.9, almost three million dollars in insurance. So that's a big chunk of the ball game there.

C

G

Had a question, did I understand correctly at this point when we approve, we anticipate approving the budget two weeks from now september, 15th correct.

E

Right correct, sir.

G

All right, and once we approve that budget, uh our contributions to non-departmentals are approved at that point, such as the contribution to the seafood museum right.

C

G

E

Did I understand that's correct.

G

Okay- but I understood you to say, mr leonard, that those quarterly payments will come before the council to be approved. Well, if they're already approved in the budget, there's no need to do that is there. I mean.

C

G

C

It's on the docket, I guess.

E

It's on the document. It's on the.

G

Data- I just wanted to be clear about that.

E

G

And mr glavin's point is is well taken and that is we don't know what the rep we are always guessing at our revenue.

E

G

And but a once we approve the budget, then these appropriations are good to go, but, as mr glavin mentioned, if our revenues are lagging that far behind, we have to reconsider some of these.

A

G

Then I'm assuming at that point the budget amendment. These would be right.

E

Yeah well right, which is what we typically.

G

E

Just want to just just one comment: uh councilman, and that is that's true of the cta and uh the taxi claim, association and so forth, and and it's true of the agreements what's what's not true- is that if it's um cruising the coast for example, they then send us an invoice.

G

E

uh If it's the council of or the casa group, they send us an invoice and those invoices make our way back to the council.

E

um I don't know why that is, but that's what we've done in the past on the donations, shall we say the donation side of the of the budget, all right so to be sure, so they didn't. They didn't give us a budget that we had to prove they did they just okay.

G

They just asked.

E

For so much money.

G

But entities like the library have from what I just heard those numbers are baked in this budget. We're going to prove this budget they're ready to go. That's the you mentioned invoices d. Are they expected to invoice the city quarterly.

E

They are, and they do, okay, all right.

G

I'll better understand that now I just wanted to be sure. Thank you.

E

Thanks for making that okay.

C

Point so everybody's comfortable with from the expense side what we did last year versus where we are right now: okay, and that bottom line, total expense, is 62 827, something whatever 768.

C

all right from the revenue standpoint again, uh the big hitters, the the the you know, the the numbers with six heroes behind us is coming from gaming and also uh sales tax. um So it uh I think these figures at about uh uh the 10th of uh september.

C

uh We had kind of scheduled some revenues and other financing sources and against this is on the left-hand side down. So at 2020 a year we started estimating 59.58 or 50 yeah 826 in revenues from the various categories.

C

Again, what has happened is that you know there's about 5 million less in it and given where we are with this last month. We're hopeful that it could be a little bit better situation, but we programmed, I think, the most conservative situation, where we're going to absorb a 5 million hit now again. 1.3 million is those uh extraordinary uh expenses that we took by the three weeks during the emergency time that total to be about 1.3 1.4.

C

I think when it total this is for covid, so we absorb that hit in the salary we're hopeful in this budget year that we'll get reimbursed for that lost or extraordinary expenses and again it's not booked. The lost revenue. Opportunity may come come along too, but, as mike mentioned, we took every opportunity to refinance which actually saved us. uh 377 000 this year filled that part of that 5 million dollar hole, and so that you know that brings us to. You know uh the things we we can.

C

We can do now in programming what we need to do next year, but the combined fund statement last year for physical 2020 showed an estimated beginning balance of 8 million.

C

This is the lower left-hand part of the screen of the uh spreadsheet, with that 59 million dollars in revenues and almost 2 million in other financing sources and the with the 65 million dollars in expense.

C

We were going to end with 4 million 100 and 4 104 119 in cash, so that was a a decrease in cash balance of about 3 million.

A

C

3.9 million okay now keep that in mind and again as we. If you look right over to the right hand, side well, you know we're estimating not where we are right now, because we were on a pretty good tear with regard to uh uh gaming and some of these other things, so that five million, if we'd, have taken five more million, that would have been eight million down okay.

C

Yet we would, you know doing what we did: we're estimating to start 10-1 with 3.372 million in cash okay. So in looking at the expenses for 2021 and the revenues we estimated of 59 million 595, plus some other financing sources that I think 1.3 diane, is that the reimbursement from uh okay for fire trucks? Okay, that's most of the the uh capitalization, but anyway bottom line is the revenue component would be added those two numbers together.

C

So if we start with 3.372 in cash, 10-1, add the revenues of 59 and other financing sources of one two: two: that brings us minus the two six sixty two million eight twenty two. It brings us to a one point: four million dollar balance, but that difference is just one point: nine million, so you know the jump from indian cancer.

C

4.1 take five more million dollars away from the revenues we did not receive through coven and put that I think it's an extraordinary extraordinary position to be only seven, eight hundred thousand dollars off of what we actually scheduled back in september of 2019..

C

Okay, we did reduce our expected gaming revenue by about a million three billion four for next year. Is that right by million and a half and uh about the same for sales tax?

C

But we did increase the budget for uh avalor. There was some a number of properties that rolled off into the the abatements have been rolled off, and so that accounted for the increase in our general property tax. So we increased it from almost a 10.8 million to 11.2.

C

That was the good side of where we are right now.

C

So you know if everything goes according to plan, and- and this is a very conservative number if you, if you look at the expenses in the revenues, uh we're going to start off with 3.3 million in cash, uh pay some expenses and wind up about about 1.4 million at the end of the year. Now again we're trying to guess where we're going to be at this time next year,.

E

Actually we're even guessing.

B

C

We're going to be this time next month, but we got a little bit more educated. Yes,.

B

So the question.

C

I didn't see the enterprise.

B

Funds on here, yeah.

C

Commissioner, that's that's in your package. What pages were that? You got two schedules. There.

E

C

This was the biggest I'm I'm showing.

E

That the water sewer fund will, in the year end the year end 2021 with a balance of 3.9 million. You.

C

Don't have it on this sheet, though right now I don't. Actually, this is just general funds.

E

It is what it it is. It is on the package that I handed out that I in the email to you right it's in there. I know they're tiny numbers and I can make you a bigger one, but.

B

E

Fund will end to a 3.9 million balance, and port will end with a 2.3 million balance, so both funds will not. Both funds will be solid in this budget, both of the enterprise funds. Will this.

C

Gain cash balance.

E

And that's thanks to uh the council allowing us to raise the water rates just two percent. Every little bit helps.

A

Mr mayor, are you ready to take questions no.

C

I'm ready to take questions councilman.

A

G

Yes, thank you really um just some observations. I want to be sure that I'm I'm correct. We talked about the number of employees.

G

These uh we show the actual employees and the positions vacant. You noted that we're going to start with a few empty positions right at the beginning of this fiscal year. It did not include any of the. I guess what we'd call seasonal employees correct. We.

C

E

G

Recreation right.

E

Well, more than 50 that's correct!.

G

For example, we have part-time lifeguards, some of those positions uh won't be or may not be filled, but like they're not indicated here as being filled, and that's that's going to crimp uh folks, women in the natatorium or particularly at the snyder center in the pool. Yes,.

G

C

And I was about 50 about 50., about.

G

50., okay, so so the so the typical part-timers that are lifeguards at snyder or the natatorium are still there. It's just the folks that are hired for summer programs or when the demand goes up.

C

All right about 50 total, I think that's what we're talking about.

G

G

Okay, great that's good news, yeah, okay, but that does include those summer, employees that are hired, for example, like the city summer camp, which we did not have this year.

E

And and ours is not budgeted.

G

And it's not budgeted for this next year now, at some point it we may be able to, but right now folks need to understand that that's not in the budget for next year. The other observation on the projected revenue mayor, looking at your big spreadsheet, we talked about revenues of projected to be 59, 595, 596, yeah, 59, 595 916., and I just note that this is typically and george. You can probably back me up on this over the years, because you've been here a few more years than most of us.

G

Well, actually everybody in the room, I think, and uh typically our revenue runs 58 or 59 million. I think unless we get some sort of federal funding for something uh you know grants or something, but but typically so our revenue.

G

If we had not been knocked for a loop this year, we would have had a pretty good year right, but that's not the case and we're hoping things are a little better than what's indicated here, but it seems to be a reasonable projected uh projection in our expenses.

G

Right now projected to exceed our revenue, but we do have some cash that we're bringing forward, which will help us, among other things, all that to say that this budget, for the most part, looks typically like most of our past budgets. It's just that. I think a under the circumstances. I think the administration again has done a very good job managing the money. If we had more money, we could make more people happy.

G

We could offer more services in a timely fashion, but it's tough to recover from four and a half or five million dollars that you counted on, but didn't have with only four or five months left in the year. So that really concludes my comments. Thank you.

E

A

Thank you, councilman tisdale, um councilwoman, newman, councilman lawrence.

B

On this uh of the sheet mic on a non-deported, that's the 200 000 that you had to back the insurance on the the 2.8. You went.

E

To 3 million the end, the major change in the non-department budget is the increase from 2.7 to 2.9 million for insurance.

B

So the insurance you added a 200 000 in to the insurance and property insurance.

E

And, and uh at your meeting on the 15th, we have frank bordeaux scheduled to come in and talk you through where we are on the you know. As you know, not all of our policies uh start in the first of september, some start in march. Some start in in october.

E

He's going to be he's scheduled to be at the next meeting. To talk you through is the 2.9 gonna work for us I mean we, we we had 2.9 in the budget originally last year and we took a deck to 2-7 and it ended up being 2-9. So.

B

So it needed to be at least two nine and three just to just cover the property insurance.

E

Yeah, I we don't know. I've said this before everything in insurance is usually about the absence of badness, meaning you're, not making mistakes, you're, not hurting yourself, you're, not having injuries you're, not having car wrecks, none of that's happening. The city is doing very well in terms of its performance that should drive the rates down, but the rates aren't going down, and that's you probably see that in your own pocketbook.

B

Yeah we had a meeting yesterday with the health insurance the same thing there. You know you're saving money, but everything's constantly going up. So the cr, the price is going up, we're still sitting. That's we're going to do the same budget, pretty much 7.5 million for the health.

E

Insurance, I appreciate the fact that you guys get you you gave me a heads up. I got a a report from your meeting yesterday ahead of time and then the actual came through a little bit later, essentially where we are on on the health insurance part of the insurance picture.

E

Is it's a twenty three thousand dollar increase out of eight million dollars, so it's just a tiny increase in um total claims and costs for medical insurance. So it's essentially flat.

B

That was a good thing.

B

That's it for me,.

A

That's all listen, councilman, barrett, councilman, guys councilman glavin, all right at this time, I'm going to ask if any citizens would like to speak regarding the budget. Please come to the table where mike leonard is sitting state, your name and your address, and please sign in for me we're running short on time. So we have 15 minutes left I'll, provide three minutes per person and remember we do have a council meeting scheduled after this.

A

So if these, if these remarks pertain to to the council in general or to the agenda for the upcoming meeting, I would I would request that you reserve those comments until that meeting. Is there anybody here to speak on behalf of the budget, anyone on the left-hand side of the room or the right-hand side of the room or the back there being none?

A

I will ask for a recess by one of the council members promotion by george children's to to recess who have the second. Second, by feeling, science, all in favor motion carries unanimously. We are in recess and we'll be back at six o'clock for the regularly scheduled meeting.

A

Councilman lawrence moved it councilman, guy and seconded it. Is it too adjourned? May I ask you to amend your motion to adjourn. I.

B

Will mr lawrence.

A

Amends his motion to recess to adjourn and councilman guy's motions uh second to adjournment and we are adjourned see at.

A