YOUNGSTOWN Proposed budget uses some surplus
The city finance director is conservatively projecting a 1 percent gain in city income-tax revenue.
By PETER H. MILLIKEN
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- The proposed operating budget now before city council's finance committee calls for the city to spend $1,578,953 more than it will receive this year, with part of the surplus from the end of last year making up the difference.
The budget, being recommended by Mayor George M. McKelvey and Finance Director Barbara Burtner and presented to the committee Tuesday, calls for total expenditures of $69,041,465 this year, compared to actual expenditures of $65,926,118 last year. Projected revenues for this year will be $67,462,512.
The surplus at the beginning of this year was $2,477,489, and it is projected to dwindle to $898,536 at the end of this year.
"Why let a surplus sit there and not be used? We have things we need to do with it," Burtner said. "We're still reserving almost $1 million," she noted, referring to funds projected to be left over at the end of this year.
Budget deadline: The city has been operating on a temporary budget for the first quarter of this year, and the full year's budget must be adopted by March 31, according to the city charter.
Separate budgets for the water and waste departments and a separate capital improvements and equipment budget have already been passed by council.
"I feel that my revenue projections were quite conservative," Burtner said. She noted that the budget calls for only a 1 percent increase in city income tax collections this year over last year because of a slowing economy, the closing of Youngstown Osteopathic Hospital and a Tartan Textiles plant, and the departure of Merrill Lynch.
"Hopefully, the revenue will come in higher than that. But I always try to project the revenue low and the expenditures a little on the high side. And then you're not unpleasantly surprised," she said.
Over the past two years, income tax revenues have increased by about 3 percent annually, she added.
Changes? Council may increase or reduce appropriations and change the surplus, Burtner said. "The only thing that council cannot do is change the revenue number. This revenue number is what I'm going to certify to the county," she explained.
Council members received copies of the budget at the beginning of the meeting but did not specifically discuss it during the meeting.
Councilman James E. Fortune Sr., D-6th, committee chairman, observed that federal officials will revise the city's block grant funding now that 2000 figures show its population has dropped to about 82,000 from about 96,000 in 1990. "That's going to hurt us severely," he said, adding that the city needs to attract as many new jobs as possible.