More than $1 million in federal grants will allow the city of Kokomo to cut local spending while maintaining staffing levels for police and firefighters, according to Kokomo Mayor Greg Goodnight’s proposed 2011 budget.
City director of operations Randy Morris said the $35.4 million general fund budget proposal would be a 2 percent decrease from the 2010 approved budget.
“It is a decrease in the budget, but for the third consecutive year, we’ve not had any increases in wages for our employees, and the police and firefighters have renewed their contracts accordingly,” Morris said.
Morris said the budget proposal includes no additional salaries and doesn’t cut any salaries either.
The one exception is in the budget for the Kokomo Police Department, which, if approved by the Kokomo Common Council, would no longer include salaries and benefits for three emergency dispatch supervisors and 13 dispatchers.
Goodnight is proposing to move those salaries and benefits to the budget for the Kokomo Board of Public Works & Safety, which is typically used to pay contractors.
The city wants to budget $800,000 for the dispatch workers next year, a decrease of about $300,000 from the current budget.
The city is in negotiations with the county to have the Howard County sheriff take over dispatch operations. If that happens, the city dispatchers would either become county employees or be laid off.
Morris said the budget proposes to keep funding for employee health insurance at the same level for the third straight year, while investing $434,000 into the new Novia employee health care clinic.
Per-employee health care spending had been rising rapidly for years until former Mayor Matt McKillip and then Goodnight instituted a series of measures, including higher employee contributions.
“It’s too early to actually attribute real savings numbers to it, but preliminary reports show significant savings,” Morris said of the clinic, which now also serves county employees.
The city will also attempt to save money next year by putting in a new policy of not replacing many city vehicles before 125,000 miles. The current policy is 100,000, Morris said.
While the proposed budget is a slight decrease from the 2010 approved budget, local governments almost always budget higher than what they expect to spend.
This year, the city expects to underspend the budget by about 7 percent, Morris said, putting actual general fund spending around $34 million for the year.
Finally, next year’s general fund won’t reflect the cost of the city’s largest current capital project, the $2.1 million new Fire Station 2 on Center Road.
The city is seeking a $1 million bond, to be repaid from economic development income taxes over five years. The city council has already appropriated $600,000 from EDIT for the project, and the city will seek the rest of the funding in another appropriation this year.
• Scott Smith is a Kokomo Tribune staff writer. He may be reached at 765-454-8569 or via e-mail at scott.smith@kokomotribune.com
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