2018-09-06 Special Meeting of the La Porte City Council (Amended)

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Mayor Rigby stated the tax rate as proposed by staff at $.71 per hundred. City Manager Alexander replied yes, sir. Mayor Rigby stated that he knows at least two councilmembers have differing opinions, and asked for discussion. Councilmember Earp commented after reviewing the proposed budget with staff, he is not asking for a reduction in the tax rate. Councilmember J. Martin made a motion to keep the tax rate at $0.71 per $100 of property valuation, and incorporate the budget changes discussed tonight. Councilmember Bentley seconded. Mayor Rigby reminded Council that the budget is not being approved tonight; that will be on September 10th agenda with a public hearing. There must be a public hearing before Council can pass the budget. Councilmember Zemanek commented he has some rough numbers from what Council did tonight; we saved $1.95 million out of the budget and asked is this Council willing to earmark some of this savings to moving forward with the project of the new fitness center? Councilmember Earp commented he is in favor of it and was originally going to propose to allocate about $2 million to start the funding, but to keep the budget fairly flat and not impact it from where we're at as far as the total dollars we were at, we would have to reduce it to start with to about $1.5 million, which would get us to where we are kind of budget neutral from what we cut vs. to be able to start our fund towards our rec center, if that's something everybody wants to entertain. Councilmember Ojeda commented, "Personally I am hesitant to earmark money for something that we have no idea what it's going to cost." Mayor Rigby stated the first thing Council needs to do is determine if it is something this Council wants to do — repair, upgrade, add on to the current one, or build a new one at another location. Councilmember J. Martin asked what kind of account would we set up if we were to earmark funds? City Manager Alexander stated we would have to set up a project, which is how we carry money over year to year, like we would for any other CIP project; and we would allocate the dollars as you see fit to do that project, knowing full well you couldn't pull the trigger on construction until your funding allocation met your construction cost. Councilmember J. Martin ask if Council did that, would the $1 million allocated out of the EDC be taken out and put it into this fund? If we are not going to do an expansion, and we are going to look at moving forward with new construction, would the EDC money be available for this fund? City Manager Alexander stated that while he's not looked at that question from a legal standpoint, he believes the answer would be yes, because he does not think there is a legal difference between expanding a fitness center and building a new one. Councilmember Earp asked if Council approves the budget without earmarking money for certain things, is Council free to come back two months from now if staff does due diligence and the Council has time to look at something and figure it out, are we free to come back at that time and move that money, because right now it would be just going into excess funds now, right? City Manager Alexander stated that what would necessarily need to happen...so, you're saying get the benefits of these cuts and allocate them for something else? Is that what I'm hearing? Councilmember Earp stated get the benefits of the cuts and possibly earmark those for the projects that were put forth. Mayor Rigby stated what I heard you say is put the money that we reduce the budget by tonight into a reserve fund and then two months, three months, whatever, from now, we come back and say we want to allocate X amount to this project. City Manager Alexander said he just wants to make sure we include whatever, if it's $1 million or $1.5 million, that allocation needs to be included in the Page 7 of 9 September 6, 2018 Council Meeting Minutes