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The approximately $290,000 in budget reductions recommended for full city council approval at a council budget session Monday evening include approximately $90,000 in general fund savings by transferring Community Development Director Mike MacDonald's salary to the special service district "flood fund."
The council pursued a similar transfer earlier this year, in anticipation of Local Government Aid reductions later this year, but irate citizens, the vast majority of them living in Sampson's Addition, said that the flood fund should pay for costs directly related to flood control projects and not administrative costs such as MacDonald's salary, even though he spends the vast majority of his time coordinating flood control projects. The council in early February backed away from the proposal.
So what's changed since then? Well, council members Monday evening said they felt that much of the citizen opposition was due to the fact that the proposal included no limit on how long the fund, currently sitting with a balance of about $2 million, would finance the position's salary. The recommendation that goes before the full council on Monday, April 12 will be contingent on the council reviewing the arrangement annually, and will also include a sunset. Whether it's two years, four years, or when flood control projects are complete in Crookston's at-risk areas has not yet been determined. But, council members agreed, the salary transfer won't be permanent.
"People don't want it to be just a blanket thing; they don't want it to go on forever," said ward four council member Wayne Melbye.
"We need to show the people that we're concerned about how this is put together," added ward three council member Keith Mykleseth.
City Administrator Aaron Parrish said, when the proposal was first put forth in January, that the future of the Community Development Director position would be re-evaluated once all the flood control projects are complete. The special service district itself, which takes in around $400,000 a year from a fee assessed on all local parcels, is set to expire in 2017.
There is some risk in approving the salary transfer, Mayor Dave Genereux reminded everyone. If at least 35 percent of assessed parcel owners register at city hall their opposition to the special service district within 45 days of the council's annual re-upping of the district, the council is forced to revisit the structure, modify it, and vote on it again. Affected property owners would then have another window of opportunity to register their opposition.
The approximately $290,000 in budget reductions recommended for full city council approval at a council budget session Monday evening include approximately $90,000 in general fund savings by transferring Community Development Director Mike MacDonald's salary to the special service district "flood fund."
The council pursued a similar transfer earlier this year, in anticipation of Local Government Aid reductions later this year, but irate citizens, the vast majority of them living in Sampson's Addition, said that the flood fund should pay for costs directly related to flood control projects and not administrative costs such as MacDonald's salary, even though he spends the vast majority of his time coordinating flood control projects. The council in early February backed away from the proposal.
So what's changed since then? Well, council members Monday evening said they felt that much of the citizen opposition was due to the fact that the proposal included no limit on how long the fund, currently sitting with a balance of about $2 million, would finance the position's salary. The recommendation that goes before the full council on Monday, April 12 will be contingent on the council reviewing the arrangement annually, and will also include a sunset. Whether it's two years, four years, or when flood control projects are complete in Crookston's at-risk areas has not yet been determined. But, council members agreed, the salary transfer won't be permanent.
"People don't want it to be just a blanket thing; they don't want it to go on forever," said ward four council member Wayne Melbye.
"We need to show the people that we're concerned about how this is put together," added ward three council member Keith Mykleseth.
City Administrator Aaron Parrish said, when the proposal was first put forth in January, that the future of the Community Development Director position would be re-evaluated once all the flood control projects are complete. The special service district itself, which takes in around $400,000 a year from a fee assessed on all local parcels, is set to expire in 2017.
There is some risk in approving the salary transfer, Mayor Dave Genereux reminded everyone. If at least 35 percent of assessed parcel owners register at city hall their opposition to the special service district within 45 days of the council's annual re-upping of the district, the council is forced to revisit the structure, modify it, and vote on it again. Affected property owners would then have another window of opportunity to register their opposition.
"This is no slam dunk," Genereux said. "Would enough people vote the special service district down? We have to consider that."
Another option?
Although it seemed to be news to many seated around the table Monday in the city hall conference room, City Clerk/Treasurer Betty Arvidson reminded everyone that their is another potential option to fund some of MacDonald's salary outside the general fund. The Department of Natural Resources had previously told the city, Arvidson said, that some of MacDonald's salary would be an acceptable, reimbursable expense through the DNR's Flood Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funds that have come Crookston's way in recent years, through bonding bills, to fund flood control projects.
Parrish said that he could not advise such a move. MacDonald himself echoed Parrish's sentiments, saying that the city "still has to get our hands in the state's pocket for a lot of money" in order to complete the Jerome's Addition project, and less extensive flood control measures in the South Ash Street and Riverside areas, mostly involved with acquiring homes in harm's way and stabilizing the riverbank. Add it all up and it's probably more than $20 million, MacDonald said, that the city still needs to get from the DNR program.
With a reported $63.5 million allocated to the DNR program in this year's bonding bill for flood control efforts statewide, city leaders are hopeful for a nice allocation this year to get actual work in Jerome's Addition underway, and the feeling around the table Monday was that this is not the time to risk rubbing the DNR brass the wrong way by earmarking money for a portion of MacDonald's salary.
"We've been sort of a champion in the state's eyes about how we've been able to allocate this money and turn it into completed projects in relatively rapid fashion," Parrish said. "I don't know how well doing this would play with the state. Personally, I don't think it's worth it."
