Wakefield City Council holds final budget work session

By P.J. GLISSON

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Wakefield - The Wakefield City Council Thursday held its final work session regarding the 2018-'19 fiscal year budget.

After the session, city manager Richard Brackney said budget numbers will not be firm until treasurer Sherry Ravelli fine-tunes department totals, based on final suggestions by council members.

A public hearing is set for June 11 at 5:30 p.m., after which the council will vote on the budget.

Included in the pending budget so far are as yet uncalculated contributions from each city department toward the city's Municipal Employees' Retiree System, which has been running in a deficit.

Brackney said another major expense will be $15,000 toward the replacement of a front-end loader, with an additional $15,000 per year expected for the next decade.

The city manager said it is not yet clear whether some planned expenses will occur in the current budget year, which closes on June 30, or in the new fiscal year.

For instance, he said he does not know whether the construction of a storage room within the municipal building will conclude before July 1.

Since the storage room will be created by reducing the size of his own office, Brackney also expects to have new office windows installed as part of the renovation.

He said new windows for the community room in the municipal building also are expected within the next year.

In addition, he hopes funding in the coming year will cover new bathrooms in the municipal building.

Although volunteer fire chief Mike Yon had approached the council in a previous session about his hope of expanding the fire hall, Brackney said fire department members have not yet decided what they want. If they do not make a determination in time to include it in the pending budget, Brackney said a budget amendment for that work would be another option.

According to Brackney, the current fiscal year's budget includes the following breakdowns:

-$1.5 million for the electric department.

-$1,145,000 for the general fund.

-$1,369,000 for the combination of three separate budgets for sewer, water and garbage.

-$636,000 for the combination of two separate budgets for main and local streets.

-$268,000 for the motor pool.

-$96,000 for the Wakefield Public Library.

-$35,000 for Lakeview Cemetery.

"A budget is a guideline. It's not a hard and fast rule," Brackney said.

He also assured, "Our budgets at the local level are not that you have to spend this amount or you lose the money."

Rather, he said, any unused funds from each year's budget are transferred to the next year.

In other business at Thursday's session, council members expressed pride in the success of last Friday and Saturday's city clean-up.

Brackney said "53 tons of stuff" were collected, not including metal items. "We took a lot of TVs," he said. "We took a lot of vacuum cleaners."

Brackney concluded the city's cost to unload the items at the Gogebic Range Solid Waste Management Authority would be $5,800.

He added Smily's Trucking and Excavating did not charge for the use of its facility as a collection hub.

Volunteers also worked for free, he said.