Tough budgets taking a toll on city surplus
Tough budgets taking a toll on city surplus
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News that Jamestown's unassigned surplus – its savings account, if you will – is on the low end of auditors' recommended range for a city should catch the eye of city residents.
It's a sign that, while Jamestown won't have the same trouble paying for day-to-day expenses as Dunkirk, the city's finances are still worth watching as we head into a budget that Mayor Kim Ecklund has already said won't be pretty.
What should city residents take away from the yearly audit?
The fact that the audit was done by mid-September shows Ecklund and Ericka Thomas, city comptroller, have untangled the mess that was left for them. It's taken two years to get a basic financial procedure back into place. We can think of no better justification to make sure the city always has a good comptroller than the work Thomas has had to do to simply get the yearly audits back on schedule.
City residents should also be ready for a return to no-frills budgets that they became accustomed to for the 20 years prior to the introduction of federal American Rescue Plan Act aid into the city budget process. Jamestown can't rely on Chautauqua County's budget plan. Not only are costs going up in Jamestown, the tax base has been shrinking – meaning fewer taxpayers are eating a bigger portion of the city's tax pie. And the city doesn't have the type of surplus the county has to balance its budget this year.
The auditors noted what Jamestown is dealing with is a recurring theme across the state. Costs are rising, and it’s becoming more and more difficult to keep up with those rising costs with taxpayers' limited ability to pay hefty tax increases each year. What will be different is how cities deal with the situation.
Some are going to raise taxes while hoping that inflation-driven cost increases abate enough to bring budgets back into balance. Others are going to be aggressive in looking for shared services or other ways to decrease recurring personnel costs. We hope that Jamestown is in the latter group.
That path isn't easy. The city is locked by contracts into much of its spending each year. But we have to find a way to change with the times through greater regionalization of things like police services, fire services and EMS services.
Somehow, the city needs to find a way to reduce its cost burden – or the tax burden will never improve. The answer is easy. Getting there is not.