Sean C. Morgan
The city of Sweet Home Budget Committee took a second look at the decision it made two weeks ago to donate cash to local charities.
The committee agreed two weeks ago to reduce the amount of money slated for the building reserve fund by $33,000, leaving $312,000, to restore funds to the parks summer recreation program, increasing it from $6,000 to $11,000, and the city council’s community grants program, increasing it from zero to $5,000, and to provide cash to operate the swimming pool over the summer, $10,000; Sweet Home Emergency Ministries, $5,000; the HOPE Center, $5,000; and the Kids Food Pak program, $3,000.
The School District had requested $6,000 for pool operations over the summer.
During the Budget Committee meeting on May 4, four additional groups requested funding for their projects. Among them were the Foster School 21st Century Community Learning Center program, Sunshine Industries, the Senior Alcohol Free Entertainment (SAFE) Party and the Sweet Home Alumni Foundation.
Mayor Fentiman was among the Budget Committee members voting to approve the donations two weeks ago. After thinking it through, he changed his mind and questioned the decision last week. His concerns were the donations to SHEM, the HOPE Center and the Food Pak program, but not necessarily the restored city programs.
“It was one of those kind of situations you get hit with it at the beginning – You really don’t get a chance to think about it,” Fentiman said. “You process it through. It just didn’t sit well with me that we were only giving money to those three individual organizations.”
It’s also bad policy to draw that money out of the building reserve fund, Fentiman said.
City officials opened discussions about a new City Hall last year, claiming that the 57-year-old building is beginning to have problems.
“The more money you can put in there it’s going to be less money you’ll have to borrow in the end,” Fentiman said.
Some citizens may not want their public dollars spent this way, said Mayor Craig Fentiman. “With the way budget constraints are, I don’t think this is a good road to go down.”
Based on that, Fentiman raised the issue of withdrawing the charity funding.
“At this point, I really don’t know about the city programs,” Fentiman said. “I’m really giving some serious thought to saying we’re not going to restore anything. I’m kind of limbo on that one.”
Regarding the pool, “I really haven’t made up my mind on that one either,” he said. “I’m basically saying maybe we shouldn’t just fund any of them.”
“I don’t think anything we did last meeting we have to be sorry for,” said Dave Holley, the committee member who proposed donating money to SHEM, the HOPE Center and the Food Pak program. He has no personal ties to any of the programs.
He has no problem voting yes or no on new requests, he said.
Scott McKee Jr. agreed with Fentiman.
“We set in place the community grants for alleviating this process,” McKee said. To be more fair, he suggested that the organizations seek funding through the community grants program, maybe including a lesser amount in the program to help the charities if they request the money.
He said he also supported spending money on the pool but reducing the city’s contribution from $10,000 to the requested $6,000.
“I think that we did open the floodgates,” he said, and he feels passionately about them all.
McKee noted that the recreation program is a different conversation than the charitable contributions. He continues to support funding it at last year’s level rather than the reduced level proposed by city staff.
“That program already existed,” McKee said. “It’s a really strong program. We’re just restoring the balance.”
Chuck Begley told the committee that he doesn’t feel adequately qualified to decide who gets the funding and who doesn’t.
“I don’t see how we can offer money to some of these groups and not to others,” Begley said. He suggested possibly waiting until the end of the process and deciding if the budget had room for a lump sum without affecting the mission of the city.
“I don’t want to see us get to the point that the only thing this budget covers is city employees’ wages and benefits,” Holley said. The city is not spending the money being transferred to the building reserve. It’s simply adding the money to the reserve fund.
“I don’t have a problem taking away everything we did last week,” Holley said, but if it is taken away, “let’s take everything away.”
The committee had one written request, he said. He suggested considering that and putting the $13,000 for the food programs and HOPE Center into the council’s community grant fund and let the council decide.
Responding to Begley’s comments, Committee Chairman Rowley said he was concerned about viewing the budget from an accounting-only perspective.
“If all we were about was crunching numbers, we could use a computer,” Rowley said. “We’re about people.”
Looking at allocating resources in a way that helps the citizens during these tough times is a good thing, he said. The consideration is well within the purview of the committee.
“It was very appropriate to allocate resources to help these projects continue in these times so we can help preserve the nature of our community,” Rowley said. “I had no qualms with supporting the actions we had taken.”
The city has taken a fairly conservative budget approach in the past and is in better shape than other government agencies, he said, but it hasn’t been with such a tight hand that the city must ignore the needs of the community and the needy.
“My personal perspective is that we slice that pie,” he said. “I’m not ashamed of how we slice it.”
The committee took no action to reverse its decision on the funding. At its next meeting, 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday in the City Hall Annex, 1140 12th Ave, the committee will review the proposed Public Works budget and likely decide whether to approve the budget recommendation to the City Council for final approval.