Editor:
I personally know most of the City Budget Committee and City Council.
Many I consider friends and I’m not disparaging any of them. Hopefully, as a society, we can still have honest disagreements without everybody thinking we dislike each other.
In this upcoming budget year it is projected that there will be some levy money left over after the police and library have paid their bills.
This is a rare but welcome turn of events and I believe the police and library should save this money in dedicated Reserve Funds within their respective departments, and as a hedge against the inevitable future times when things are not as rosy.
Because of this surplus, the city administration has, instead, proposed taking money from these previously voter-approved Police and Library Levies and transferring it to the General Fund to cover increased spending there.
The city manager has stated that this type of a transfer “is considered to be a best practice,” and is recommended by the Government Finance Officers Association. But according to the GFOA’s website, they warn about this practice;
“Such a strategy must be pursued very carefully though, lest it degenerate into unjustified subsidization of general services at the expense of the clientele of these others’ funds.”
“This (transfer) can be a tricky technique because cross-subsidization is a (seemingly) quick and easy fix to financial woes within a fund. There may be very good reasons for revisiting subsidization policies, but it is important that the policies follow sound financial reasoning.”
I believe the city manager’s recommendation is likely based upon the accepted standard of funding police services, a statutorily required function of city government, directly from the General Fund.
However, to my knowledge, Sweet Home is the only city in Oregon where 100 percent of police funding is pushed out to a standalone levy. Because of this, I believe these transfers are “at the expense of the clientele of these other funds” and therefore do not “follow sound financial reasoning.”
The Budget Committee acted upon the recommendation of a relatively new city manager and a new finance director in approving this transfer of funds. However, neither of these men have witnessed how precarious our police and library levies are. Voters may, or may not, feel inclined to support a Police or Library levy knowing part of the money is going to another, already tax- funded, department.
I have always advocated and supported our Police and Library levies, because I know the General Fund is not large enough to support these services without levy support. But I’ve always been able to assure the folks that the levy money would go exclusively to the intended purpose.
The city made us this same assurance in their ballot summary for the current Police Levy: “All revenues received (will be) used to provide continued funding for the City of Sweet Home Police Services operations through June 2021.”
The city is now arguing that these newly proposed transfers are in keeping with this voter pledge. You decide.
The proposed transfers total more than $180,000 from police and $47,000 from the library levies and include $144,368 from the police and $24,061 from the library to supplement the City Manager, his assistant and the City Council’s services, plus their operating supplies; money to partially pay for Finance Department staff, plus an additional fee to process payments for daily police and library operations (It’s worth noting that both the police and library already receive, review, approve and then code all their own bills into a software program. That report is then transmitted to the Finance Department, leaving only the checks to be distributed); a “contingency” line item, even though each department has already accounted and budgeted for a contingency line item within their own budgets; and $10,863 from police and $1,686 from the library for a line item called “Communications,” which is presumably for a citywide Public Information Officer.
The problem here is the police department cannot reasonably use a civilian PIO for police operations. Their spokesperson must have full access to confidential police investigations and know what can and cannot be released to the public at any given time. And the police department already has its own PIO;
There is also money being transferred out for a website, auditing, ordinances, and the City Attorney.
I hope the City Council rejects this proposal, at least for now. If the city wants to propose this during the next levy renewal process, that’s OK. At least, the voters would know where their Police and Library Levy money was going prior to casting their vote.
In case the council feels it absolutely necessary to supplement the General Fund from the levies, I have written them a letter with a suggested alternative. My proposal is still bad, overall, but at least it offers a bit more public transparency.
Robert Burford
Sweet Home