Holton Commission receives budget requests

Concerns about employee salaries, park security and Holton’s municipal swimming pool surfaced Monday in the first round of requests for the City of Holton’s 2017 budget.

During Monday’s Holton City Commission meeting, commissioners heard initial requests for next year’s budget from the city’s street, fire, police, parks and recreation and administrative departments. Action on those requests, as well as those from the city’s water, wastewater and electrical production and distribution departments will be taken later this summer.

Holton City Manager Bret Bauer said the budget presentations heard on Monday, as well as those to be heard at the June 6 commission meeting, will be worked into a full budget to be presented for review at the July 18 meeting. If commissioners are happy with the budget, Bauer said, action on the budget could be taken as soon as Aug. 1.

In the meantime, commissioners continued to hear concerns over the lack of merit increases for longtime employees, a concern previously raised by Street Superintendent Rex Cameron at the commission’s May 2 meeting. This time, however, it was Police Chief Gale Gakle’s turn to voice that concern.

“We need dedicated loyal employees, and in order to keep those employees who are willing to go the extra mile, we need to provide them with some type of incentive. Without an incentive, it is difficult to keep an employee’s morale up,” Gakle told commissioners. 

Gakle and the city’s other department heads have experienced “frustrations regarding employee merit increases,” echoing Cameron’s concerns from the May 2 meeting over difficulty in retaining “dedicated and loyal employees” when more recently-hired employees receive “the same incentive as a 20 or 30-year employee.”

Bauer said the city is looking at means to reward employee longevity, but external forces — namely the property tax lid that was approved recently by the State Legislature — are tying the city’s hands. With that tax lid in mind, he told commissioners, if merit increases are going to be considered, the commission must do so before Jan. 1, when the tax lid goes into effect.

As a result, Holton Mayor Robert Dieckmann asked City Clerk Teresa Riley to compile a list of employee salaries in all city departments, “starting from the top down,” to investigate options for incorporating merit increases into the city’s pay schedule.

City officials also raised concerns over the city’s parks and recreation facilities, including Holton’s municipal swimming pool, where water leaks have been a problem over the past year. In 2015, it was reported that about four inches of water were leaking daily from the pool, and city employees attempted to repair the leak.

But on Monday, Bauer relayed information from Parks and Recreation Director Mike Reichle that “the pool is not holding water,” losing six inches of water over the weekend. City employees are trying to locate the source of the leak and repair it before the pool opens for the summer season, he added.

Commissioners also expressed concerns over security in the city’s parks, mainly Linscott, where there have been issues with vandalism at the shelter house and on the recently-resurfaced tennis and basketball courts. Commissioner Dan Brenner said he had spoken with police dispatchers about those issues, but there are some instances where dispatchers can do nothing about them.

“There have been issues with bikes and roller blades on the tennis courts, and we need to extend that out because we just spent $13,000 to refurbish the tennis courts,” Brenner said. “Our tennis courts really look good, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

Brenner’s suggestion of placing another security camera to monitor the tennis and basketball court was viewed favorably by Gakle. However, putting a camera in the shelter house to catch young people jumping on the picnic tables would not work because there was not a way to make them “vandalism-proof” there, he said.

“We just didn’t feel that we could secure a camera in the shelter house and make sure that they couldn’t destroy it in there,” Gakle added.

Bauer noted that if another camera is placed in the park to monitor the tennis court, that expenditure would most likely come from the city’s electrical distribution budget.

Budget requests included:

n Street Department: Street Foreman Greg Tanking presented the budget request for 2017, noting an actual 2015 budget of $387,513.76, the commission-approved 2016 budget of $382,348 and the projected 2017 budget of $403,529. It was Tanking’s first budget presentation for his department, as Cameron has announced his retirement effective in July.

Tanking told the commissioners the general street budget request included $40,000 in capital outlay funds for the purchase of a two-ton truck, “in case you choose not to purchase one for us out of the equipment reserve fund next year.”

Commissioners also reviewed the “special highway” fund, which Tanking said is used to purchase road materials and pay for special projects. The presentation showed an actual 2015 budget of $290,548, an approved 2016 budget of $283,499 and a projected 2017 budget of $316,000, the latter also including a $40,000 capital outlay request for the purchase of a truck.

Tanking said his request for the special highway fund would cover the costs of one block of brick street restoration and two loads of road oil for chipsealing, the latter of which should cover 27 city blocks. The price of road oil for next year was estimated at or near this year’s oil costs, he said, noting that the oil for this year has not been purchased yet.

“We don’t get our oil purchased until it’s time to chipseal,” he said.

n Fire Department: Fire Chief Kevin Ingels presented commissioners with a 2017 budget request totaling $313,880, up from the approved 2016 budget of $282,542 and the actual 2015 budget of $262,209.16. Much of the increase was in the department’s capital outlay fund, where only $9,500 was approved in the 2016 budget; Ingels proposed $30,000 in the fund for 2017.

The fire department is looking at “some bigger purchases coming up in the next few years,” including firefighting gear, radio batteries and possibly water hoses, Ingels said. However, he told commissioners he would prefer to spread the purchases out over a few years rather than take care of it all at once. 

* Police Department: Gakle’s request for his department’s 2017 budget was $608,793, up from the approved 2016 budget of $574,384 and the actual 2015 budget of $526,918.46, with most of the increase going for personnel salaries. The request included a $35,000 line item for capital outlay, which Gakle said he wanted to use to replace a patrol car and outdated equipment, “if need be.”

* Parks and Recreation: Bauer said this department is requesting $356,869 in general park funds for 2017, compared with the approved 2016 budget of $346,247 and the actual 2015 budget of $342,292.90. He noted Reichle — who was unable to attend the meeting due to a family emergency — was planning to use his department’s budget primarily to benefit Countryside Park.

* Administration: Bauer said the general administration fund is requesting $36,568 in 2017 budget dollars, compared with the approved 2016 budget of $35,881 and the actual 2015 budget of $40,393.24.

Water and Wastewater Superintendent Dennis Ashcraft, Electrical Production Superintendent Ira Harrison and Electrical Distribution Superintendent Scott Frederickson will present their 2017 departmental budget requests at the June 6 meeting, Bauer told commissioners.