NILES Council OKs budget of $41.28M

The budget includes $80,000 for a new roof on the city safety building.
By DENISE DICK
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
NILES -- City council passed a spending plan for next year that is $2.8 million more than the 2001 budget.
The panel passed the $41.28 million budget at its meeting Wednesday. The 2001 budget was for $38.41 million.
The largest portion of the increase is $1.1 million in the light department budget for excise tax, said Neil Buccino, city auditor. The light department remains the department with the largest budget, at $20.75 million.
The plan also includes $775,430 for capital improvements, about $175,000 more than this year. Planned capital improvements include North Road improvements and other road resurfacing projects.
The 2002 general fund budget is about $2.9 million, up $453,000 from this year's appropriation.
The budget also includes $275,000 for city income tax refunds and $80,000 for replacement of the roof on the city's safety building, which houses municipal court and the police and fire departments, $40,000 for improvements at city parks and $21,000 for busing.
Cable system: In other business, council clerk Lisa Smathers read a letter from the Niles Men's Democratic Club, supporting a city-run cable system. Mayor Ralph A. Infante Jr. has resurrected his idea for such a system.
Voters have twice rejected the plan, most recently in 2000.
Time Warner Cable, the company that supplies cable service to city residents, sent a letter to Infante and council members, notifying them of the company's new channels and rates.
Councilman Stephen G. Papalas, D-at large, who has said he won't support the idea until he's provided with more information, said he's getting a satellite dish, adding that he thinks it will provide better service than either the company or a city system.