Watertown City Council begins budget deliberations

Apr. 29—WATERTOWN — The City Council spent more than two hours Monday night deliberating the city's fiscal year 2024-25 budget.

Three departments took questions from the council, including the Water Department, Department of Public Works and CitiBus.

Of note in the proposed budget is an increase for taxpayers on water and sewer prices in the city: a 5% increase for the water fund and a 3% increase for sewer.

City Comptroller James E. Mills said he would like to see small, moderate increases rather than no increase — necessitating a large increase down the line. Last year's increase was around 10%.

Mills said the plan is to use some of the money from the fund balance as well as the rate residents pay for water. For water, the city plans to use the increase plus $577,000 from fund balance, and for sewer they proposed the increase and $407,000 from the fund balance.

When looking to cut down on costs, council members looked at removing a $655,000 hydro-excavator purchase that is currently being proposed.

"We've survived a long time without one. We use the DPW's sewer vac, I know it's not as specific, but it's a large cost and it's also a maintenance item," council member Ben Shoen said. "I know it'd make it easier for sure, but it's a lot of money."

It is currently being proposed as a five-year serial bond, with payments of $155,100 a year split between water and sewer funds.

Getting the hydro-excavator, which could be used for both water and sewer, would be used for the city to excavate and thaw frozen service lines, help with hydrant replacement, as well as main-repair work.

City Manager Eric F. Wagenaar said the advantage to purchasing one instead of borrowing from another municipality is the availability, should there be a water or sewer break.

"When I'm looking at this, and from what I've heard from the public, they don't want a 20% increase, so I'm looking at this with an eye toward things we could potentially do without. Maybe that is one of those things, I would put it on the 'maybe' column for now," Mayor Sarah V. C. Pierce said.

The Department of Public Works has proposed around a $400,000 demolition of a four-story building. Councilwoman Lisa A. Ruggiero asked why demolish it instead of selling it.

DPW Superintendent Brian MacCue said the cost for someone to use that building "would outweigh" putting a new building up.

"That's how bad it is," he said.

The overall plan would be to demolish that building and build a new one, MacCue said.

Councilman Cliff G. Olney III raised questions about whether to fix up the DPW building and City Hall — if it is something that has to be done now, or if it could be done in a different way, as deficits are projected in future years.

"Are we at the point where we have decided that it is necessary for us to build a new a DPW building, and if it weren't — I'm just speculating, if it weren't done, would we even be close to that kind of deficit in 2027," he said.

Olney said the city should look at other revenue sources.

Councilman Robert Kimball said that in the last few years' reports, deficits have been similar.

"You fall behind like $3 million, like we have this year, $3.5 million, then next year we're $7 million behind, then the year after that we're $11 or $12 million behind. So basically, in the next three years, counting this year, we're $20 million behind, revenue to expenses. And that's been remarkably stable over the last three or four budgets that I've looked at," Kimball said. "So if you can pull out some magic sources of revenue, Mr. Olney, I'd be happy to see them. But otherwise I think we have to look very carefully at this, but not try and brush it away as prices are going up. That's exactly what the problem is."

Kimball said this might be the year the city has to make up for property taxes staying flat or going down in previous years.

Olney said the city should look at sales tax, and while Mills recommends keeping $10 million in fund balance for cash flow, Olney said that number could be around $8.7 million.

An increase in the price of trash stickers to $4.25 from $3.50 was also discussed. Shoen asked whether that could be spaced out more with increasing the cost to $4 before going up to $4.25 next fiscal year.

During discussions with CitiBus, Transit Director Kyle Meehan said it is looking to add two part-time positions.

Meehan said it is his goal to eventually have buses run later and on Sundays. Buses currently stop at 6:15.

"The more people we get in the seats, the more we get reimbursed from New York state. The more miles we go, we get reimbursed from New York state," he said.

Council members will meet again at 7 p.m. today to look over the fire department and parks and recreation portions of the budget.