Van Buren council approves 2011 budget; ups water rate

story by Marla Cantrell
[email protected]

At the Monday (Dec. 20) meeting of the Van Buren City Council, aldermen approved the 2011 proposed budget, gave raises to city employees, passed an ordinance increasing water rates, and approved a plan to spend approximately $300,000 on levee repairs.

The new budget is $11,664,803, an amount only $57,000 above this year’s actual budget.

Mayor Bob Freeman remains cautious due to the lack of growth in tax revenues. The one cent city sales tax isn’t growing as it had in previous years. The 2009 total of $3.5 million is lower than the two previous years. In 2008, (the year of the hail storm) the tax brought in $4 million. In 2007, the total was $3.6 million.

There are some areas where costs will go down, such as the salary for the city attorney, which dropped from $57,000 to $12,000 when the council scaled back the job description in May.

But there are some big projects to fund as well. The widening of Rena Road looms large for Van Buren. The $7.3 million project will receive $4.5 million in federal funds. The city is responsible for approximately $2.8 million in matching funds.

“There’s $1.5 million for 2010 that’s earmarked for Rena Road, that’s just sitting in the bank,” Freeman said.”It’s going to take most of our capital improvement funds as we move forward. … We have $1 million in our capital improvement reserve fund that can be used if something happens. … If we see the bids come in for Rena Road higher than we expect, we can dip into our reserve or we’re going to have to borrow money and pay it out over a three or four year period.”

Although the budget is tight, the council approved 3% raises for city employees, and gave a 10% raise to the police chief, whose salary rose from $49,200 to $59,500. The fire chief’s salary will be $57,400, up from $52,100.

“Both salaries were well below the average for other cities our size,” Freeman said. “And our city employees didn’t get raises in 2009 or 2010. I think it’s the right thing to do.”

Alderman Bill Swaim chimed in: “We can’t really afford it, but at the same time we can’t really afford not to. … They’ve got families just like everybody else.”

The mayor, city clerk and district judge also received a 3% raise. The 2011 salaries are as follows: Mayor – $61,325; City Clerk – $45,370; District Judge – $53,470.

In other business, the council approved an ordinance to raise water rates for residential and commercial users for the first time since 2007. The average cost increase for a household using 5,000 gallons of water a month is $1.25.

Improvements to the levee gates and Port Road were addressed. The new gates will slide in and improve the sill, the mayor said.

Wilson Brothers Construction’s bid of $286,480 was accepted for the levee work, which includes repairing an existing closure gate on Main Street, widening Port Road from Highway 59 to accommodate traffic, and installing and new concrete sill at First and Adams Street, where railroad tracks cross the roadways. The project also includes raising a levee gate, repaving a portion of Adams Street and drainage improvements along Port Road.

The bulk of funding will come from at $175,000 Arkansas Natural Resources Commission grant. The city will pay the remainder.

Dates for the January and February council meetings were changed due to the holiday schedule. The meetings will be on January 24 and February 28.