JAMESTOWN – The Jamestown City Council met on Monday and while city officials spent an-hour-and-a-half reviewing the tentative 2016 city budget, members were unable to find any further cuts to the 35.1 million spending plan.
Councilman Brent Sheldon brought forward a series of potential cuts that totaled nearly 240,000, some of which consisted of cutting part-time positions that are currently vacant in Parks, DPW, Police, and the Clerk’s office. However, Jamestown Mayor Sam Teresi explained that those positions were connected to various contracts and/or excessive departmental workloads and as a result they were kept in the budget.
Sheldon also proposed a plan to charge an ambulance service fee and have the fire department respond to more medical emergency calls, with the city then billing the patient’s insurance. But after further discussion with city deputy fire chief Chet Harvey, it was determined the possible revenue that could be generated was minimal, compared to the downside, which includes added costs through equipment and training.
No other city council members were able to come forward with any cost-cutting amendments, but council president Greg Rabb said there’s still time to bring ideas forward.
“I think this has been the most difficult budget in my years here, and I knew that going into it,” Rabb said. “I think we got the best we could, but we’re still open to new ideas and we do have a week to think this over.”
The only two changes to the budget so far is an increase in the BPU dividend payment by $232,000 (in addition to the $250,000 requested by the mayor in his original budget) and a restoration of $2500 to the Senior Center, which saw funding cut by $5000 in the mayor’s initial budget.
The $35.1 million spending plan is now calling for a tax rate increase of just over 4 percent, which is over the state-mandated tax cap.
Jamestown mayor Sam Teresi will hold a public hearing before signing off on the tax cap override. That hearing is scheduled for 9 a.m. Monday, Nov. 30. The city council will hold its voting session the same day at 7:30 p.m., with action expected on the final amended version of the budget.
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