City Council - workshop

Well, good morning, everybody. I think we'll go ahead and get started. Clerk, will you call the roll?

Orlis.

Here.

Halliburton. Here. Morales. Here. Nash. Stead.

Here.

Willits.

Here.

Six present, one absent.

Well, we've got one item on the agenda this morning, and it is our budget. It's great to see you, Alicia. Before we get started, I just want to say I'm really looking forward to this conversation. All of our department directors are here today to ask any questions that might come up. Our plan right now is for Alicia to walk through the kind of revenue aspects as well as the expenses. And I just want to say that after Going through that work session where we heard from all the departments, we had a great conversation about from internally what's needed, but also really appreciated hearing from the public on their concerns. And so what we've done with this budget is it sought to do three things, balance three things, and that's recognizing the financial pressures that all of us and families in Boise are under, making sure that we can maintain the services that residents rely on, and it is getting more expensive and As we're growing and things are getting more complicated, folks expect the level of service we've always had, and we want to do that. And so there's pressures there. And of course, we have to protect our community's future as we grow. So as we all discussed last week, the revenue... projections changed after our long meeting, which was exciting because we knew that it was a lot to ask of our residents. And so to know that we had more growth and more revenue coming in from a sunset urban renewal district was really helpful. And so this discussion today reflects the changes we discussed last week. I'm not proposing we take foregone or the 3%, but instead we've dropped it down to 2.7% total. And we can still do what we'd sought to do with that first budget. So we use that unexpected revenue to keep us even. And so with that, looking forward to hearing from Alicia and the discussion that we're having this morning. Thanks and welcome. Great. Thank you, Mayor, Council Members.

Pleased to be with you this morning. Here we have an overview of our agenda for today. First, I'd just like to give a huge thank you to the budget team. A ton of work went into preparing the proposed budget that was released last week. So just a big shout out for all of their work. So today we'll cover an overview of the 2027 proposed budget. I'll provide a context and approach. We'll talk about the operating side as well as capital. I'll sum it up and then we'll have time for the motions before we go into the noon meeting. All right. So just a summary of the process and how we've got to where we are today. You know, we started engaging back in March with a priorities discussion. We then met to discuss the capital improvement plan. We had another work session focused on public safety. And then on May 19th, we had department presentations that covered the proposed budget. We released the proposed budget on June 16th. And then here we are today with the proposed budget workshop where we will cover kind of all of the ins and outs. Next up, we have the public hearing on July 14th. And then on August 25th will be budget adoption as well as the approval of the L2 program. On the public engagement side, we've had a public feedback website live since April 8th. We've been receiving a lot of feedback and that's been shared pretty regularly by community engagement. And we'll have that up until the public hearing on July 14th. So just a reminder that we, in addition to the public feedback website, there are other opportunities to interact with budget information on the finance website. We have the 26 budget as well as prior year budgets as well. And then we have a budget transparency tool that has more live up-to-date financial information about the city's finances through the transparency tool. All right, so the 2027 budget build approach this budget was built on three core principles align priorities with a multi year investment plan focus on maintaining current level services and preserving flexibility for future year needs. So as we discussed in previous workshops, we have limited flexibility, just about 1% of general fund flexibility is available each year. And many of council's priorities require new funding sources and multiple years to implement. So every budget request that was considered is competing for that roughly 1% of flexibility. So this budget makes progress on those priorities while recognizing that current resources are insufficient. to fund every desired investment. But there are funding tools that are in progress. We have the public safety bond and levy exploration that's in the works. The city is implementing the grants first approach. We have philanthropy that's also being explored. And then we have an impact fee study that is being updated. will come to council on FY27 with the impact fee study update. So high level, the 2027 budget at a glance, all in total budget is about $1.2 billion. So pretty big this year. Some of the driving reasons for that large number include the Concourse A capital project at the airport, as well as water renewal projects. within public works. And then enterprise, or the general fund, 347 million, and the capital fund at 53.3 million. All in all, total FTE is over 2,000. This budget is proposing 25 new, and in the upcoming slides, we'll get into a bit more detail on exactly what those are. So just as we set the context here, a reminder that with the 27 budget, there is one technical change that's being proposed. And this is really around improving visibility into the cost and operations of golf. We are moving golf operations and capital from the general fund to its own independent fund. We're calling it the Boise Municipal Golf Special Revenue Fund. Nothing is changing in terms of operations or capital planning or anything of that nature. It's just really an accounting move. It really aligns with municipal best practices. And as I said, improves visibility into the true cost of operating golf and will allow us to report on the Gulf financial performance separate from the general fund activities. So we'll have independent reporting for you all going forward starting October 1 of 2027. So looking at general fund staffing trends, the FY27 budget is – We're calling it the run the business budget, but only nine new FTEs are proposed in FY27. And this is really a historically low number. The only other year that we had nine was the COVID year of fiscal year 2021. And of the nine, most of those are revenue supported or required to sustain current level services. Looking at enterprise and special revenue funds, there are 16 FTEs proposed, 10 for the airport, and those are related to the construction of Concourse A project. Three are at the Warm Springs Golf Course. Two are within water renewal, and then one is within the Solid Waste Fund materials management. So for our general employee compensation approach for fiscal year 27, our goal is to remain competitive in the labor market while staying within our long-term forecast assumptions. So the proposal before you is a salary increase of 3%, also targeted market adjustments of half a percent where needed just to be able to stay competitive where really needed in key positions. And then flex rewards that equate to 1% of base pay. And in order to afford this, we will be eliminating the annual one-time performance pay. And then health insurance, the employer contribution increase will be 3%. So now I'm moving on to general fund revenues. You've seen this slide before, but just to give you an overview of what is included in our general fund revenues at a high level, 73% of the general fund is flexible and available for funding core general fund operations, think fire, police, library, parks. Property tax is the key. funding source there at 62%. Sales tax, liquor tax make up smaller shares. And then 22% of the general fund is dedicated reimbursements for services. So we have departmental revenues. Those are charges for services. So zoo admissions or business licenses. And then we have development fees. So those are the charges that planning and development services charges for planning, inspections, and those fees can only be used for the cost of recovering the services that they provide. We also have internal charges. So those are the fees that we charge internally to recover the cost of providing indirect services, think finance, accounting, And then we have one time resources that are generally unavailable for balancing the budget. These are fines, forfeitures, and carry forward balance that make up less than 4% of the general fund budget. So to go into a bit more detail on department revenue, it makes up, it's about 37.4 million for fiscal year 27. Again, these are user fees and service contracts to cover the costs of city provided services. The largest component is public safety contracts. So we have service contracts with Whitney, Sunset, North Ada County, fire districts, as well as with BSU and the Boise School District for police and the airport to provide public safety services. So that makes up the largest share, but you can see here, we charge fees for other services as well. Overall, most fees, and you will see this again when we talk about fees later in the presentation, are increasing a minimum of 3.5%. And this was a centrally calculated rate. We looked at personnel cost growth from the prior year and determined that In order to keep up with city cost growth, we needed fees to increase by at least this much to continue with the pace of increasing rising costs at the city. So this was a centrally determined rate that we directed departments to set their fees at, knowing that there might be other cost drivers as well, but a minimum of this as a driver for departmental revenue increases for FY27. And as a reminder, scholarships for parks programs are available for individuals who may not be able to afford participating in our park programs. Development fee revenue has been a headline story when I've come to speak with you over the past several months, and it continues to be. As we've discussed, development fee revenue, it continues to come in at historical highs. It's been averaging about $3 million per month. This is a restricted revenue source, so again, not available for general government use. The current drivers include Micron, hospital expansions, general commercial and multifamily development. Fiscal year 26, we're anticipating that it's going to exceed FY25 and likely exceed $30 million. The proposed budget includes an increase over where we were at 26, but we're anticipating that as the projects wrap up, that the fee revenue will decrease and that will stabilize. As I said, recent revenues are historically high, but they are expected to decline as these major projects near completion. So we will be working with PDS and coming forward with a more longer term sustainable fee discussion about cost recovery and what that looks like after this budget wraps up. Alright, the next couple of slides are related to state shared revenues. The first is state liquor sales. So we don't receive liquor sales directly, we receive it via the state. So the state collects the liquor tax and then they take their share of operating costs, and then it gets distributed 50% to the state, 50% to local governments. From there, 49% goes to cities and 36% to counties, and then 15% goes to the court system. And then from there, the city share distribution, it gets allocated based on the city share of statewide liquor sales. 90% of it does. And then the remaining 10% is distributed to cities without liquor sales, liquor stores, excuse me. And it's distributed based on population. So as you've heard me say in our quarterly report updates, the state has been experiencing declining liquor sales trends for five consecutive years. And that's based on consumption trends. And so fiscal year 25 revenues finished below expectations and fiscal year 26 estimates indicate this continued weakness. So we are not considering this a growth revenue source and future forecasts just assume stabilization rather than growth at this point.

And a question about this. So our estimated share is reducing about 4.5% annually. Is that solely due to the legislative changes or a mix of both?

So the 4.5% is related to the legislative change? Right.

That's what I thought. And I just want to point that out is that so as we look and as our residents are asking about the pressure on property taxes versus other things, there's quite a few tools in other cities and other states' toolboxes. And what we're seeing with the few tools that we have beyond property tax is a redistribution of that revenue. So we're losing 4.5%, which is quite a bit when we're really looking at how we continue to provide service amidst rising costs due to legislative changes.

This was a recent legislation just passed this session that redirected some of the liquor tax to Idaho State Patrol. Next revenue source, sales tax revenue. It is also collected by the state and then distributed to local units of government. 11.5% is shared with local governments, and of that 11.5%, 45.2% goes to cities, 47.1% goes to counties, and then 7.7% is directed to special districts.

Madam Mayor, Alicia, one quick question. So is it the 89% of sales tax that's not going to cities is absorbed by the state? Okay, thanks for clarifying. Correct.

And beginning in 2020, the legislature changed the distribution formula. So each quarter, cities are compared based on sales tax revenue received per resident. So cities above the statewide average are generally limited to the 1% quarterly growth, while cities below that average receive full growth. So generally, Boise has been above that statewide average and has then therefore been subject to that 1% growth. However, there have been a couple of quarters in 2022 and then this past last quarter in 2025 where we were below it and we received full growth. And when we receive full growth, it is permanently added to our base. And so that is reflected in our forecast here. So it is assumed, that's why you'll see we are assuming a 3% increase because we received full percent growth third quarter of 25, and then we're assuming 1% growth in each quarter of 27.

Madam Mayor, Alicia, can you explain again the full growth and how we reach that?

Yes, so the full growth piece is because when they compared Boise's population change relative to other cities, we were decreasing per capita and others were increasing. Moving on to our property tax recommendations. So as we discussed last week, our property tax recommendations, we are taking 2%, 2.7, excuse me, 2.7%, which is below the maximum allowable base increase of 3%. We'll also be taking the maximum allowed under amount of new construction. And under HB 389, it is 90% of what would otherwise be available. And that is resulting in a base reduction of $325,000. So we would be generating $325,000 more if not for HB 389.

And I ask that this be included because we all believe that growth should pay for itself. And what we're seeing with House Bill 389 is that the legislature won't allow it to pay for itself. And in the most recent large development approvals that this council said yes to, the Murio Farms, some of the conditions that you put on are tied to this being fixed by the legislature. So in this year alone, this is the amount of money we lost in not allowing growth to pay for itself. And cities continue to work together to advocate for growth paying for itself and to ask the legislature to correct this part. And when that happens, some of those conditions that were put on Muriel would change as well.

Okay.

And then likewise, through the sunset of the West Side District, we will be taking the increase associated with this being added to our property tax rolls. We'll receive 90% of that taxable value, but it does equate to a $280,000 reduction. So in total... between the new construction and Westside, it's $600,000 approximately in loss-based funding due to HB 389. And then to date, just looking cumulatively, we estimate it's about $9.2 million in base impact due to HB 389 that we have lost in tax base.

Matt Amir?

Yes.

Alicia, just before we move on from this slide and maybe just seeing another way, Matt Amir, confirm if I'm not going too off here. On number two and three, I mean, we're saying we lost over half a million dollars. But another way to say that, if we continue maintaining the level of services and run a business, essentially property owner, current residents are subsidizing over half a million dollars because we're not taking that full. I mean, that's another way of saying it, right?

Yeah. And except I wouldn't say because we aren't taking it. We can't take it.

And then the final component of our property tax recommendation is allocating $900,000 to continue the property tax rebate program, which in the next slide, Just go into a bit more detail. I know you're all familiar with it, but we have the city of Boise is the only city in the state to offer this program. So Boise residents who are eligible for the state circuit breaker program can also apply for the city's property tax rebate program. And so in our budget, we are allocating $900,000 to continue this program in the 27 budget.

And on this, I'd say there's a lot of frustration with regard to the revenue cuts that the legislature has taken through tax bills. But this is a legislative bill that passed a couple of years ago. And I think it's great because it continues to give cities tools. It gives cities tools to then make a local choice as to whether or not we too offer property tax rebates. And I understand why other cities aren't using it, but It's a program that I'm really proud of that we are and grateful to the legislature for creating it.

So one of the questions that we hear frequently is how property taxes have changed over time. So this chart compares the average assessed home value in Boise County. to the portion of the property tax bill. So the orange bar shows the average assessed home value. And since FY20, the average home value has increased from $326,000 to 546,000. So that's an average of 67% increase. And then the green line you see shows the city of Boise's portion of the property tax bill on the average homeowner. So over that same period of time, city taxes have increased about 23%. So for FY27, the average home value is anticipated to increase about 2%, while the city portion of taxes increases about $9 for the average homeowner. So another important takeaway kind of looking at this chart is that FY27 projected city tax bill is approximately $1,615 or very close to that five-year average that's shown on the chart. And really only $32 higher than FY23, even though the home value is pretty much the same as it was in FY23.

Madam Mayor, Lucia, can you, and I know this is a tough question, but can you explain if I'm a resident and I hear that the city is going to increase taxes by 2.7 on property taxes, does that automatically mean that my property taxes go up 2.7%?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Willits, it does not automatically mean you're one individual's property taxes will go up by 2.7%. And I think my next couple of slides will help explain.

And that's a great question because it's so hard to talk through what the increase in revenue means versus like what the tax increase is.

One reason is because of the residential versus commercial property tax burden shift. So historically, residential property tax owners have assumed a larger share of the overall tax burden as residential values have grown faster than commercial. And this burden shift peaked around 2022, as you can see, hopefully, on the chart. I know there's a lot going on. And that's when residential properties made up approximately 69% of the tax burden. Since then, commercial growth has helped shift it back a little bit.

And I want to cut in there because it's not just commercial growth. It's a correction in the assessments. I'll never forget when we had the former assessor in this room and he explained that residents, when they sell their house, they always fill out the form we get in the mail. And we let the assessor know how much we sold the house for, and then it's assessed at that amount. And there's not a requirement to do that. And so commercial folks tend to know not to do that. So the former assessor had said, we just don't have the information to right-size this assessment. With the new assessor, she's attempted to do some of that. And so that's where we saw that kind of correction. Yes, we've had a lot of commercial growth, but there was also a correction in the commercial assessments versus residential assessments, which I really, again, for our residents appreciate.

So Council Member Willits, hopefully this will get a little bit to your question. So this chart separates out, it attempts to separate out the portion of tax growth attributable to city budget decisions from the portion of changes in the tax base and property market. So on the gray bar below is kind of baseline. If we were to hold city taxes at what we levied in FY22 And then the red section shows city budget decisions over time, just between zero and 3% since 2020.

So the gray is 2013? Yes.

And here, if we were to hold the red then, is we were to track with CPI, if we were to track with inflation, that's where our... taxes would have kept pace with at the red line. And then the peach section reflects changes that occurred outside of the city's budget process. So these include property value, values increasing faster than commercial properties, declining value of the homeowner's exemption, appreciation of the Boise home relative to the broader tax base. So it's trying to separate out what's been decided here versus what's happening in the broader market. Holding steady for CPI.

So then to Council Member Willett's question, since 2020, or we could even look at since last year. So the difference between last year and this year, is $26. Is that how we read that? The 285 to 311?

That's the portion, correct, based on, yes, going from the 4% that we took last year to the 2.7 that we're taking this year.

Alicia, do you have more slides on this?

No.

Okay. Madam Mayor? Yeah. All right. So obviously this is a very helpful chart. This shows that property taxes are going up because housing values are going up, right? Then you also have what the city is taking. So if I have a constituent that says, all right, if you pass a 2.7% increase, what's it going to look like for me? What's the answer to a constituent?

met a mayor council member, Willits, the answer is going to be different for every property tax or every homeowner.

So let's say somebody called you, what would you tell them?

Yeah, I would say, um,

And I know it's complicated, but I think we owe people an explanation.

Alicia, will you use, just to help you along, the average? So because we don't know somebody's assessment. Let's say the average homeowner's value is X and that person would pay Y. Right. Because then they can do the math of, oh, it's half of that. It's three times that, whatever.

Right. I would direct them to our budget book where we show them the impact on the average home because what we're showing is a $9 increase based on our analysis. And that's on what page?

And it is on page 95.

Excuse me, 95.

It's an open test. Council Member Morales has it. Okay, so 94, 95. Walk us through that.

So we are comparing here the assessed value of the average assessed value from fiscal year 26 to 27 based on Ada County provided data. Then we're assuming the homeowner's exemption, $125,000, to get row 23, the total taxable value. We then apply the city's levy rate, which is calculated based on how much we are levying total versus our divided by our total tax base. And then we get the total taxable city taxes. So we're comparing what that would have been in 26 to 27. And the difference is what the average homeowner would pay.

So if your house is valued at $550,000, because that's the average house assessment, you're going to pay $9.40 more than you did last year. So if your house is $1.5 million, it's $27,000, $28,000, $20,000-ish that you're paying. So that's a great way to talk to residents about it because then they can do the math rather than any of us knowing what their house is worth.

Madam Mayor, just if I can dig a little bit deeper in there. So that's at the 2.7% proposed increase. Do you know what the average household impact would be at the full 3%?

Yes, because right below that on the side, it shows that difference. So it would have been 12, 13 and change. Yep.

We're reading that correctly.

Correct. Madam Mayor, Council Member Halliburton, we have on page 94, if we would have taken a 3% increase, the change would have been $14. Yep.

And so for the average household, if we took the full three, we would be looking at $14.11 for the average household. Do you know what the... the total funds generated for the city would be between the two. So at 2.7, we've got what we are seeing right now. If we did take the full 3%, what's the difference in additional funds for the city? Does that make sense?

Probably the easiest answer is to demonstrate the additional revenue that came from new, I think that's the easiest way to do it, right? Because we pretty much broke even, which was $2 or $3 million in new construction, a couple hundred thousand dollars. And was it $3 million-ish total? You can go and friend. Mayor, Councilmember Halliburton.

I think that it is about $600,000 that the city would, in additional revenue, if we were to increase the levy from 2.7% to 3%.

Oh, right, because I'm talking about the foregone plus the 3%. Yeah.

So, Madam Mayor, Alicia, I think I just went with, I took the city levy rate for 3%, subtracted 2.7% city levy rate, got that difference, and I multiplied that by the taxable market value and got about 600,000. So that's the number I got.

Can't you graduate from what state of schools? Ha, you did.

Thank you. So again, just to kind of clarify, so a difference between about $9.39 for the average household with the proposed 2.7 increase. For the average household, it would be $14.11 if we took the full three. And if we took the full three, it would generate about $600,000 in additional funding for the city.

Great.

Correct.

Madam Mayor, if I can just add another way of looking at that, that $4.72 difference between the 2.7 and 3%, that's 39 cents a month. Yeah.

Anybody else want to show off your math prowess by creating some more questions that require math?

Madam Mayor, I don't have any algebra questions, but I want to be mindful if you have more slides. I have just a couple clarifying questions up to this point. Okay. You want a break from the math? Okay. I need some clarification on the flexible rewards. So is that a 1% that managers can use then to increase to the base, or is that a 1% that is a bonus?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Willits, it is not added to an employee's base. It is just like a bonus payment. But it is, yes, calculated as 1% of an employee's salary.

Okay. So I'm wondering if pay for performance and the flex rewards are the same thing. I mean, aren't they both bonuses? Yes. No. No.

Okay. Let me explain again. Sorry. It is a Flex Rewards. We use it to provide real-time rewards to employees for great work above and beyond, and it can be given throughout the year, but it is not added to an employee's base pay in an ongoing way. It is one time.

Okay. All right. Okay. And then I had two more questions. Yeah. And you've got a whole row of experts. So do not do not feel like you have to answer all of these. I was curious on the 20 million in change for public safety that that the city of Boise takes in.

Sorry. Can you say that again? I didn't catch the first part.

Twenty million dollars that that we take in by providing contracts for public safety. My question is that we've done that in various settings for lots of different cities. I'll use the example of the Meridian Legal Department. Then when they got their own, then we had to compensate. I'm curious, to date, do we have any inclination that this $20.5 million will change? People are going to say, we can do it on our own. We don't need you anymore. We're forward facing budgets. Like how secure is this 20 million fee for service?

I'm going to ask the chief to come up and address that.

Madam Mayor, Council Member Willits, I can speak on the police side. The contracts we have for the airport and then for the Boise State, we don't anticipate those going away. We're currently in contract negotiations with Boise State University for the police contract there. But neither of those I anticipate going away. And for Boise State to actually create their own police department, it would require legislative change.

Got it.

Thank you. Thank you. And then, oh, yeah, Kelsey, you want to come up for that? Kelsey's here for fire. I'm sorry, I didn't see you back there.

Madam Mayor, City Council, Willits. So from a fire perspective, it is very different with the police contracts. Our fire contracts are with, sorry, I just walked up the stairs, are with Knackford District and Whitney District. And both of those have been very secure partnerships for well over a decade. With that said, though, there is some legislative changes happening within fire districts, as some of us may know. We are in conversations with those districts to make sure that we continue to have secure partnerships with them. The districts are having to make strategic decisions themselves, but we are integrated into those conversations and still feel very secure about them at this point. Yeah, thanks.

Keep going. I do have one more, and this is, this is more of a, I have a very specific comment and then or question and then I kind of like to understand in this scope of things so there are lots of things within this budget that are categorized as you said, because of ordinance, like. Previous councils, this council has said, you know, we're going to give 5% to transportation. That's $10 million. I'm curious on the development fees. And those can only be used to then fund those services in which those fees have been gathered. Is that also because of ordinance? Like what creates the rule that says you can only use that money for that purpose?

Madam Mayor, Councilmember Willits, state code directs us to set fees in a way such that we can only collect a fee for a service and it can't be used for profit, right? It can only be set at a level at which to recover the cost of providing that service. So when we're charging fees, we're thinking about that statute and thinking about what are the costs that the city incurs in delivering that service and kind of thinking about that holistically. But those are the, yeah, those are the driving factors, state code.

So the city can collect indirect fees But the city couldn't say, hey, we got an extra $3 million at the airport. We're going to go put it in parks. That's no go. Correct.

Yeah. And one thing on this too, and this is staff is working on this. I've asked them to work on this, is to truly look at the cost of providing permits and fees and to look at those kind of back office costs and how we account for them. And so in this budget, it is what it is. But in the long run, We want to make sure that our fees reflect the true cost of that because there's legal costs, there's IT costs, there's all those pieces. And we still wouldn't be able to take that money in and put it to parks or to libraries or anything else. But we could bring that money in and pay for the cost of service from those departments. And so that's something, not for this budget, but that the department and the city team is looking at in the long run to bring back to council.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Alicia, do we have a citywide indirect rate or does it vary by department?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Willits, we have a citywide cost allocation plan. So we allocate costs equitably across all departments according to that plan.

Okay, thank you. Mm-hmm.

All right, now I'm gonna turn to the expenditure side of the general fund budget. So big picture, general fund expenses total $347.8 million, personnel costs being the largest driver, smaller shares being, so 69% personnel, 20% M&O and major equipment, 8% transfers, so transfers to primarily the capital fund, 3% to Valley Regional Transit, and then a smaller share for contingencies.

Madam Mayor, Alicia, before I move from that slide, just a quick question. On that 8% transfer, is this an average or is this particularly looking at fiscal 26 transfer to capital fund?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Corliss, this is FY27 transfers, primarily capital, but There are other smaller transfers included in that 8% as well, but capital transfer is the largest.

Yes. Sorry. Thank you for clarifying. The 8% transfer is what we're proposing for fiscal 27 into the capital fund.

Capital fund, and there's also a small transfer in there, and yeah, some other smaller transfers.

Okay, great. Thank you.

Yeah. So this is just a look, you've seen this chart before, general fund expenditures by department. The big takeaway is public safety is our largest department expenditures, fire and police, followed by parks and rec. And just for your awareness, shared services includes HR, city clerk, and organizational effectiveness for the purposes of this chart. Um, so general fund personnel being the largest share or largest expense category, we wanted to break it down, uh, for your awareness here. Um, so of personnel, uh, 58% of the personnel category is salaries. Um, 17% is health insurance and then 15% is, uh, per Z or retirement benefits. And then you can see the smaller slivers make up overtime and have break wages, one-time performance pay, things like that. And our overall personnel budget is just under $240 million. So personal costs continue is one of our biggest cost categories, and it is rising faster than property taxes, our largest revenue source. So historically, looking back in fiscal year 2020, personnel costs exceeded property tax revenue by 2.3%. But now bringing us to fiscal year 27, that gap is 11%. And this gap is driven by FTE growth. It's driven by wage increases, personal increases, health insurance increases. So overall, you see on the bottom, our compound annual growth rate for personnel costs is about 5.3%, while the compound annual growth rate for property taxes is about 4%. Other cost growth considerations. So these are other categories where costs are growing faster than that 3% property tax cap. We looked back at the past sort of eight years, did a CAGR compound annual growth rate calculation. Software is growing at an annual rate of about 12%. Fuel is at 5%. Insurance is at annual rate of about 6%. And then one thing, I think we mentioned this when we had the good property tax news, but Percy did eliminate their planned FY27 rate increase. So that is reflected in the FY27 budget. We'll speak more about the capital fund in upcoming slides, but construction cost escalation continues to be a cost pressure. So this budget does include a $5 million general fund transfer increase over fiscal year 26 to support capital projects as well as escalating costs in the capital fund.

Madam Mayor. A question about Percy. So on software fuel insurance, we kind of see the average annual increases. Percy, we don't see an increase this year, but I think we have seen increases for the last several years and there's no real guarantee that there won't be an increase going forward. Do we have any idea over the last few years, percentage increases in Percy outside of this one?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Halliburton, They canceled the planned rate increase for next year. They last year voted to delay the rate increase that was also planned. So I'll have to phone a friend to inquire about the latest increase. So Percy, it will increase as our salaries are increasing. So we see Percy contributions increasing for that reason. But the actual rate increases, I'll have to phone a friend to...

Would it be safe to say, though, in past years, we have seen increases in Percy rates and that there's a chance that we could see increases in Percy rates again in the future?

That is fair to say. And there is currently a planned Percy rate increase of, I believe, one and a half percent in fiscal year 28, July 1st, 2028.

Madam Mayor?

Alicia, thank you very much for the slide. I think it's good to see how our costs are escalating amongst different, I mean, software is a huge one, fuel and insurance. Question on the insurance side, is this health insurance and property insurance costs combined?

MetaMare Council Member Corliss, this is inclusive of all insurance. So yes, property, liability, insurance collectively. Okay, thank you. The next slides will get into the proposed general fund changes. I've shown this slide at the May 19th workshop, but just a reminder, this is the decision prioritization waterfall that we used when prioritizing the general fund budget requests. So run the business. These are the non-negotiable requests or the changes that are needed to maintain the current level of service. One-time items, these do not reduce future flexibility. The next level are revenue offset. So changes that have their own revenue to support it. So it's neutral to the general fund flexibility. And then finally service expansion changes. So new ongoing spending that does reduce the general fund flexibility. So nine general fund positions. Four are revenue neutral. Three are funded by that development fee revenue that we discussed previously. One zoo maintenance worker. one pool maintenance worker, and this is to staff Whitney pools and the new splash pads throughout the city. We have two attorneys that will be staffing the courtrooms due to additional county requirements. There is a HR physical security staff position as well as an additional librarian at the Hillcrest Library. So I won't go into every bullet point on this slide, but there's just under $3 million of run the business service continuation investments included in the budget. So the general themes of these investments include operating impacts of prior investments, such as maintaining new parks, including increasing our capital transfer to maintain our assets, We have maintenance and operation budget increases due to contractual increases throughout departments. And then compliance and risk management. So streetlight maintenance and invasive species mitigation are a couple of the investments that are proposed to continue running city services. Also within the run the business umbrella Boise police, there are a few investments here there's an $800,000 increase to the police overtime budget. To continue to meet service expectations and provide budget stability there's $100,000 increase to their professional services agreement budget due to contractual increases that are. outside of our control. And then a $300,000 increase for technology optimization. This is related to the continued support of replacing Axon and then supporting ongoing costs of other technology tools. Also in the public safety space and maintenance and operations budget increase for fire, They have a number of contractual increases within their budget, as well as continued support for the trauma intervention program for crisis response. We have an increase to the EMS contract, as well as their medical provider contract. This budget includes $6 million in one-time investments. And this allows us to preserve flexibility into the future for future budget investments. So we have categories including technology modernization, records preservation. We have federal grant match for fire radio replacement, as well as the BUILD grant for the Lake Hazel extension corridor planning. There's facility and infrastructure improvements, as well as some strategic community investments that are one time in nature, including LA to energy for some solar energy that supports vulnerable populations. We're also increasing the capital transfer one time as well.

Madam Mayor. question on the capital fund transfer maintenance from our last budget workshop. It was noted, I think we still had, was it $70 million in multi-year kind of deferred maintenance that's not in this being left on the table? Is that the right number?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Morales, I think, I don't know if we have an exact number, 70 million. Yes, I think it's around that, that we will continue to chip away at with each capital budget.

Mm-hmm.

And then within the revenue offset category, there are several positions that we already mentioned, and these are really growth and demand-driven services. neutral to our flexibility, as I said, because there is new revenue that will support these investments related to parking services, maintenance and operations budget, as well as planning and development service investments and a new staff member at the zoo. And finally, within service expansion, meeting community needs, There's additional funding for library materials, as well as a new librarian at Hillcrest. And then this budget includes one-time funding for three years for nine firefighters as match for the Safer Grant. So this is... positioning for a multi-year investment plan. We have not yet identified ongoing funding if we are successful in receiving this grant. However, we do have, as I said, the three years of match funding for the SAFER federal award. And here. as I said, $671,000 for the SAFER grant. And if successful in getting it, it would fund three new stations, four-person staffing at three new stations. All right, now I'm gonna switch gears and just speak more about the capital fund. So, Capital fund revenue for FY27 is $35.7 million. So we are increasing the general fund transfer with this budget. There is a decrease in some of the other revenue categories, but it doesn't reflect necessarily a reduction in ongoing capital capacity. It's just kind of a reflection of one-time grants or impact fee transfers that are really dependent on cash flow and project timing. So high level overview, there's $13.4 million in major repairs and maintenance, which is a 32% increase over the fiscal year 26 adopted budget. 16.6 million in capital projects, and that does include 1.5 million for the rehab of the annex garage, the city hall annex garage, as well as 12.7 million of major equipment. So within major equipment here, you can just see the breakout. Public safety is the largest share of major equipment. And with this budget, we are funding three fire engines. And then other major equipment includes 2.3 million for parks and smaller amounts for planning and development, replacement vehicles, IT equipment, library. And then we also have... some sort of contingency or unallocated funds for inflation. And then, as I said, major repairs and maintenance is budgeted 32% higher. We are budgeting $6.5 million for parks, for playground replacements, bridge rehabs, greenbelt repairs, hazardous tree removals, as well as $6.8 million for facility maintenance throughout the city. Some examples include $3 million for completing the downtown library parking lot. And then another 3.8 million for public works facilities team to tackle the deferred maintenance and also for ADA improvement. You've seen this slide before, but I think it's a really important one. Just our rule of thumb that MRM is very important. Every dollar that we invest now saves us money in the future from replacement costs. It prevents accelerated deterioration and extends our the useful life of the city assets and so that is part of the driving reason we are increasing the MRM budget by 32%. And capital projects just some highlights here 26.4 million we have. 8th Street, the $2 million for 8th Street, and this is continuing from Idaho to Bannock. We have $2 million reserved as seed funding for West Boise Library Access, $5.4 million of impact fees funded projects for Magnolia and Molnar Parks, $1.5 million for Optimist Youth Sports Complex, and then we also have $3.7 million designated for our ERP project. I mentioned the 1.5 for Annex Garage and then 1.8 million for the Police Technology Optimization Axon project.

Madam Mayor. On the seed funding for West Boise, the 2 million, in the budget book, I saw, I think it was about 750,000 that was transferred. Where else would I find the full 2 million within this budget?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Willits. So In the 27 budget, we have $790,000 that is specifically designated as a new transfer for the seed funding. The remaining $1.2 million is supported by the capital fund balance. So as I said, the capital... Fund transfer is about $5 million higher than it was in 26. So we're taking that excess capacity and dedicating it to the seed funding. I would say also in 27, each year when we are reviewing and looking at our fleet replacement schedules, there was some deferrals from 27 to 28 and later that created some additional capacity in fiscal year 27 of a couple hundred thousand dollars that created additional general or capital fund capacity for the additional 1.2 million as well.

Madam Mayor. Alicia, on that seed funding for West Boise Library Access. So I'm just curious, depending on the runway on acting, using that money could be a while. Maybe it's sooner. Is there a point where that money kind of stays in capital and just remains two million forever or where maybe it goes? Maybe Treasury is investing that to maybe continue to keep up with. You know, inflation, that kind of stuff. Is there an opportunity for capital to be able to be invested in a way that keeps it kind of in line with with increases in inflation?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Morales, we do have investment income that comes into the balance of the capital fund and just, you know, it generates and we use it as additional revenue in the fund as a whole. We will continue to keep this $2 million reserved. And if the body chooses to add more to it, we can always do that as well.

So Madam Mayor, follow up, then how is that investment, I'm assuming it doesn't stay with maybe what we had allocated here, it just becomes balance that could be used and allocated to something else. But potentially we could say next year, $2 million worth of investment gets added to this. And we could choose going forward to continue to see this kind of seed funding grow with the investment return. Am I thinking about that kind of correctly? That we would need to practically separate that kind of full total investment piece or the full investment return that we're getting from the full fund from Chris, segment out.

I'll jump in here because the money is in the capital fund. And like every other allocation, once it's in there, so $2 million for West Boise. Seed funding, $11.5 million. I think if I remember correctly for the Lowell pool, it's in there at that number. It would be unusual for council to say it's definitely within your purview, but I want to talk about some of the operations things that would likely happen then to say the $2 million plus whatever it makes in the market. next year, because we're not doing that with others. Every year there's revenue in from those market returns that sits in the capital fund for council and the mayor's office to then allocate to council projects, but we aren't tracking the returns from each designation. And adding that to the designation. So however many years ago it was that we put Lowell Pool in there, that number has stayed the same. And we could grow it by looking at what's in the capital fund, but we're not tying it to market changes. We could lose money with the market if we tied it to.

So pivoting from the fiscal year 27 capital plan and looking forward to fiscal year 28 through 31, I'm just going to highlight some of the projects that are planned, but few key funding assumptions. We are planning ongoing funding of $7.1 million of general fund-based transfers to the capital fund. We are currently assuming the existing 2022 impact fee study, but as I mentioned previously, we are currently undergoing a comprehensive plan update, and we will bring that to you within the next several months. And then potential public safety bond exploration is also underway. So looking at Parks and Recreation specifically, there on the left-hand side, you'll see some 100% impact fee proposed park projects, including Alta Harris, Mariposa Park, Pierce, some West Bench, and Bora and Boise Hills Park. Within the capital improvement projects category, Lowell Pool, as Mayor mentioned, as well as Stewart Gulch water transportation project. And then significant investments, again, within the major repairs and maintenance space, building maintenance, playgrounds, greenbelt, and bridge repairs within those categories and pool repairs.

Madam Mayor? Mm-hmm? Thank you for delineating it this way. I think that's really helpful. What's an impact fee from development? What's being funded through the capital improvement through general fund? I want to make sure that I understand for the FY28 to 31, have these things already been allocated in terms like we put money aside or we need to put money aside in the next three years?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Willits, our current capital fund is balanced, these projects have funding allocated to them. Now taking a step back, looking citywide within the major equipment space, we have $40 million in equipment replacement plans. This again, citywide. So mostly for public safety, of course, but also for parks, library and public works and IT. Within major repairs and maintenance, completion of the annex garage, continued ADA compliance, continued work within our deferred maintenance or major repairs and maintenance projects for facilities, and then additional funding for the downtown library, the other floors of the downtown library. And then on the right, these are our annual recurring programs. The amounts listed here are the annual amounts that we have. So these programs we fund every year from the capital fund at these amounts. And if there are any questions, before I move on to fees. Yes, Madam Mayor.

Can you go back to, yeah, let me hang out on this slide for a little bit. So, and if we need to pull up either Public Works or Parks and Rec for the previous slides, I'll have a follow-up question about that one. My question is really on the major repairs and maintenance and especially sort of the deferred maintenance and trying to figure out whether or not are we keeping track with our timeline for deferred maintenance with this budget? Are we falling further behind? Is that list getting longer? And so I'm trying to have an understanding of when we look at this 10.8 million kind of for city-owned facilities, if we're growing, if we're shrinking, if we're maintaining and kind of where we're at, both for public works and I think probably for parks.

I will give, Madam Mayor, Council Member Halliburton, I'll give a canned response and then I can ask Lindsay or maybe to come up for more specifics. But my understanding is we have a 10-year plan. You know, the city has $1 million, 1 million square feet and over 50 facilities that we manage. And there's a 10-year plan for addressing the deferred maintenance. And so They are prioritizing based on the most urgent needs and trying to reduce risks as much as they can with the funding that we have provided.

Yeah, and possibly when you answer the question in more detail, I think what I'm trying to understand is there was additional funding in the budget Are there deferred maintenance projects that we would be trying to tackle this year? Or are we, have we, with the funding that we've allocated, there's a 32% increase. Are we getting to all the projects that are possible to do this year or are there unfunded projects still that need to be done? If that's more clear, maybe that was less clear.

Madam Mayor, Council Member, Holly Barton. Yes, we can always do more projects. However, our staff capacity is pretty limited right now, but, um, as Alicia alluded, our deferred maintenance for the portfolio that we manage, which includes administrative, City Hall West, City Hall Downtown, public safety, library, some parks and rec. We have about, from our asset management collection, $16 million in deferred maintenance, but that's just that portfolio. So that doesn't include other parks and rec, deferred maintenance, and MRM. But we have a 10-year plan to be strategically picking away at that 16 million for deferred maintenance and just ongoing routine maintenance, preventative repairs, replacement as assets come to end of life, such as roofs and then building systems. So we feel pretty good about our plan for that existing portfolio. But there are definitely projects that we continue to sort of move along and hope to find other funding strategies to get some of those taken care of.

That's helpful. When we're thinking about deferred maintenance, council maybe should be thinking about it in two different ways. There's both the cost of the projects that we're looking at, but then there's also the staff bandwidth to manage those projects. I think what maybe I heard you say is that we may be at about max staff bandwidth, even if there were more funds to manage any additional projects.

Madam Mayor, Councilmember Halliburton, that is a good assessment.

Okay, great. And again, if we need to pull in parks or someone else, is that also similar to parks? Like if we're looking at greenbelt maintenance, if we're looking at other kind of parts maintenance projects, similar there and like our staff bandwidth capacity is kind of matching the funds that are currently proposed in the budget?

All right. Madam Mayor, Council Member Halliburton, that's accurate to say.

Okay, great, thank you.

Alicia, oh, and Mayor. Alicia, I'm looking at this as I would as a consumer and a taxpayer. So I would rather have new carpet but we might need a new roof first, or I would rather have to remodel the bathroom, but we need an HVAC system. So I think, you know, anyone who has any sort of housing issues understands that there's fun things and there's not fun things. There's things that you really look forward to doing and there's things that you just have to do to keep a roof over your head. On of these projects, like if I look at the major repairs and maintenance, like the annex garage, that's a must do or it falls down. Would you go through like these and just kind of walk us through for the public? Like what is the, what is, what would be the consequence of not doing those things?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Willits, the consequence of not doing these projects, it's really, these are regulatory and compliance type projects, so definitely not as exciting as some of our other projects, but making sure that our buildings are accessible to all the ADA compliance work is really important. The Annex Garage, we did a structural assessment a few years ago. So we strategically plan to get this into place and we're phasing it so that we're only doing chunks of it at a time just once. One key is making sure that we provide parking for staff as well as just being fiscally responsible with the phasing approach. So we're only doing 1.5 million this year, 1.5 million the next year. And I think we have like 800,000 for the following. And then as far as FSO projects for city-owned facilities, these are, again, just routine maintenance, preventative, and catching up on some of the deferred maintenance. So think of roofing projects, the depot stucco restoration project, as well as those window restoration, and then the downtown library parking lot.

Madam Mayor, quick question. FSO, what does that stand for?

I'm sorry. Madam Mayor, Councilmember Willits, FSO is our facility service operations. Thank you.

Madam Mayor, if I could follow up on that. Would it be safe to say that some of it is risk management as well when we're looking at things like the greenbelt repair and things along those lines? Also, the lack of maintenance is potentially elevating some risk management issues as well.

Yes, Madam Mayor, Councilmember Halliburton, We definitely prioritize and evaluate the risk, both with parks and with our risk and safety and then our insurance carrier to make sure that we are prioritizing those projects to make sure we're getting those taken care of.

Great. Thank you.

Okay, next, moving on to an overview of our fee policy and schedule changes. So included in the budget is a whole schedule of all of the city's fees and charges. Most all of them appear in the book. State, as I mentioned previously, state law requires fees to reflect the actual cost of services. Most of the changes you see here are simply to keep up with the cost increases. Anything that's not included here is required by ordinance or are the sort of complex valuation based fees that are within PDS and they're displayed in separate tables. Fines are included in the fee and fine schedule. They're not subject to the public hearing process. They're housed in open book, not in the budget book. The fee changes, anything that is new or an increase above 5% requires the public hearing, which will be held on July 14th, along with our budget public hearings. So just a summary of the fee changes that are found in the book. With respect to the general fund, as I mentioned with departmental revenue, we give general guidance that there's a 3.5% minimum increase to most fees to cover the rising city costs. For parks programs, just a reminder, the scholarship funding is available. But overall, looking at total fees, there's 1,483 total fees. About 1,100 of them increased. 177 are unchanged. We eliminated 75. 37 are new and three decreased. Speaking to other funds, I believe these changes were discussed by Director Burgos on May 19th, but water renewal is proposing a 9.9% increase. Solid waste for residential, a 9.5% increase. Commercial trash, 6%. Industrial recycling, 4.5%. And then for impact fees, DFAC approved a 4.2% development impact fee increase just to keep up with construction costs. And that also will require separate public hearing on July 14th as well. And I can pause for any questions. All right. And really thank you for your time today. That wraps up my presentation. We, as I mentioned, this budget really focuses on running the business, you know, balancing fiscal year 27 while preserving future flexibility. There are one-time investments. grant match and it's all supported by that 2.7% property tax increase. So we are well aligned for priorities for multi-year investment plan. I'm happy to take additional questions, but if not, we are required to take budget motions to advance the 27 proposed budget to the July 14th public hearing.

Sorry, go ahead. Question. Yeah. Madam Mayor Alicia, give me just one second. I got to scroll back to my question here. There was a slide you had up and it was a little bit ago. It talked about how personnel costs are not keeping up with what we're collecting in property tax. Can we go back to that slide a minute? Thank you. And sorry, I didn't catch this earlier, Alicia. So we're seeing this 11% gap. And so how is that? So we're saying today our city of Boise personnel costs are higher than what we're collecting in property tax revenue. Is that correct? Okay. And that over the past years, we're seeing this continue to increase as we project out.

uh madam mayor councilmember corliss uh we're really just showing the gap currently it's not actually projecting out but just showing what the gap is now and it's driven by fte growth wage increases health insurance percy increases you know in our forecast we do um forecast our salary for general employees to remain at that 3%, which is the property tax cap. So in our forecast, we're trying to keep as many costs as we can below the property tax cap. But currently, this is the compound annual growth rate is what we're showing based on the trends and the FTE growth.

Great. And one other thing, just to clarify, Madam Mayor Alicia, is this is showing all wages, including safety personnel and standard personnel as well. How would you explain to the average person of how we are making up that 11% gap?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Corliss, yes, I would say it is a combination of a lot of factors, including contract wages for public safety personnel. It includes our increases to Percy, which, you know, our contributions increase as salaries increase, as the city increases its staff, this increases as well. So it's a combination of factors. It is narrowing a little bit as we've been, we're only adding nine FTEs this year as opposed to prior years.

Yeah, Madam Mayor, just a follow-up question. So with that 11% gap, we are making that up from other revenue sources besides property tax. Is that correct? Like the liquor tax and other areas.

And actually, I would say we're We're making up for that because we're required to have a balanced budget by having less flexibility in all the extra stuff that we can provide. So when we've talked about this budget this year and into the future, like we're focusing first on the running the business components of it. Because this can't be taken in a vacuum against the capital improvement plan or the other elements of the services that we're providing. Because all of that together, we're having to balance. Right. So just another way to say it, because of the...

limited tools in our toolbox as a city of Boise to collect other revenue sources and to manage that growth and change that we're having to make some significant changes looking at overall capital plans and our personal plans. Thank you, Alicia.

Anything else for Alicia?

Thank you, Alicia. Thank you so much, Alicia. Madam Mayor, I move to refer the following items for consideration at the public hearing set for July 14th, 2026. The first is the proposed fiscal year 2027 authorizing staff level changes by fund as outlined by staff on page 101 through 107 of the budget book.

Second the motion.

Madam Mayor. I'm gonna maybe offer a couple comments here, mostly related to this motion, but I'll just, it'll be linked to another motion later on down the line. So, folks have been, I think, reaching out to me with concerns about affordability, and I think that that's really important. Also, and a lot of those requests to run the city of Boise like a business. And I guess if I'm looking at the city of Boise as a business, I see a proposed 2.7% increase and I recognize the value in it. I do have some heartburn of not taking a full 3% increase and it's mostly related to deferred maintenance. And I had planned on making this comment when we got down to Motion D down here at the bottom, but I think with some information and some input from staff, it's probably related to this one too. I think when we look at personnel costs going up, software costs going up, fuel costs going up, insurance costs going up, a safer grant that we're applying for in the future, What we see is some lines that are potentially diverging and less and less flexibility in future budgets, especially if you're not adding more to the base, the flexibility that really is there in the base. And to make sure that we're getting to these deferred maintenance projects where we saw a slide where $1 investment today is potentially saving us four plus more dollars in the future. I think we really need to be taking deferred maintenance seriously. And I think that we need to be taking a look at some of our expanded projects, whether it's the Pathways Plan that I helped initiate several years ago, land approvals for things like Murillo Farm that we knew weren't gonna pencil or we were told weren't gonna pencil during a council meeting. We're hoping that some legislation potentially helps with that. Um, and just some of the restraints that we have from not being able to take full growth in a variety of, of different areas. What I see is a future budget. That's going to get more and more challenging every single year, unless some major changes happen at the state level that give us back some of the flexibility. And you're hearing that from all of our surrounding cities, Meridian and county, um, you know, really across the board. And that's why you're seeing a lot of people taking that full 3%. So I'm prepared to support the motions today, but I also have some significant concerns of what we would be able to do if we took 3%, what that would give us in the base this year, which is about $600,000, but what that would actually add to flexibility going forward. and allowing us to make some decisions that I think are going to be pretty hard when we're like, when we still haven't identified what the future funding is for a safer grant for, you know, addressing this gap with personnel software, fuel insurance, um, And kind of down the line. So I want to be transparent that I still have some heartburn. And when we get to the public hearing, I'm still weighing whether or not that extra 0.3% puts the city in a much better position to serve our community members going forward.

Madam Mayor, I'll add my comments now too. I'll share what I have to say before we, I guess on this motion, before we get to the others. But this is a tough budget year. I think it's difficult to balance the interests of the community. We hear, I've heard overwhelmingly, you know, they don't want to see taxes raised. On the other hand, they don't want to see service levels change. And in fact, also, as many requests come in for increased service in things like parks and parks and neighborhoods and affordable housing and pickleball access, things like that. So it's difficult to find the balance between the two. But I really appreciate staff's work on this and with the mayor's leadership and, you in what I think is a balance between continuing the service that our residents expect, as well as being really mindful of the dollars we're spending and, seeing where we can find savings and executing on those. And I'm seeing that in the budget now built in even is to continue to try to kind of find tooth comb our processes and our investments to be sure that we're spending it where we need to be. I also agree with the, I would like to us to continue to spend on things that we already own. The deferred maintenance, I think is important to continue to invest in. We don't want to, see what we do have deteriorate. So I think that this is a good balance of all that and appreciate all the work that went into getting us here.

Madam Mayor.

All right. I'm going to ask for a point of order. Are we taking comments on the budget overall or are we going to, should I expect a discussion with every motion? Okay. Then I'm, yeah. So I'm going to I won't call for a vote on this one. Yes, we'll call folks as you want to give comments. That's helpful to me to understand what we're doing. Thank you.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. Yeah, I'll add my comments. I appreciate council member Halliburton bringing up deferred maintenance in our last budget. And I think coming in today to today, recognizing some of the changes that have happened since then to be able to free up potential opportunity to invest more, understanding the return that comes, you know, 600,000 today could be a few million in savings and the future that we'll have to fund one way or the other to keep things running. But understanding that our staff capacity is maybe the bottleneck now as opposed to what we can invest. I think over the next year, I'd like to know how we can find ways to increase that without the future pressures that come with adding folks. And if there are ways that we can process this maintenance differently or more efficiently to be able to use some of this budget capability that we have. Whether that's in that gap between the 2.7 and the 3% or foregone, because it is very impactful. I think we are chipping away, but there's always more that we could do. And I think it's really important and I appreciate the budget book so much. I think it's important for those watching reporting on these kinds of things. To really look at the actual impacts as I've seen reaction to budgets being released from all the different municipalities and Boise going quite a bit earlier than the others and maybe taking taking the brunt of reaction for other agencies. understanding the real impacts here by not taking the full percent average homeowner assessed home in Boise will be saving 39 cents a month. And I think once folks actually look at the budget book, This year it's page 94 and 95. I think it's moderating to understand the real impact and grateful for all that our staff is doing with these resources. These are precious resources from our taxpayers and they're being invested in a lot of really good ways. The level of service that we have uh, cross departments, um, is significant and, um, and impactful. So, uh, just those kind of my comments coming into today, understanding that there are some limitations and also council president said, you know, uh, joked about pickleball. We hear a lot about pickleball, but of the 325 responses, I think we have in the budget feedback form, there's one. And so I think, you know, 600,000, that's maybe a cost match to get 11 new courts in Alta Harris. Right. But, um, I think we, that's a, that's a want. And we're also talking about some really big needs. So I think it's important for folks to kind of understand where, where we are in this, this budget cycle. And as council member, well, it's mentioned there's really, really important things and other things that we want. And we're trying to kind of kind of do a little of everything and appreciate all the staff that's helping us do that.

Madam mayor. Yeah, I, I, also appreciate Council Member Halliburton's discussion on deferred maintenance. I mean, we see it probably in our own personal lives with our cars and our homes. And if we keep deferring that, it will cost more. As they reported, $1 today could save the city and taxpayers $4 to $5 in the future. And I think that's something as a council we do need to keep in mind. And at the forefront, as we see funding available, is looking at that the best ways possible that we need to be allocating those dollars. And it's a tough balance because I think about that foregone is just such a small amount. If we look at that, sorry, not the foregone, the 2.7 to the 3%, 600,000 versus $4.4 and 70 cents per homeowner. it's easy for me to want to pull that trigger. But when I looked at the response, we had 320, 340 responses from people. And I just wrote down a couple of comments that I've heard from people. Difficult for seniors on fixed incomes, stretched thin and missing utility payments, living paycheck to paycheck, struggling small business owners, and costs are going up and rising fuel costs that many are already living paycheck to paycheck and maybe priced out of the city of Boise that they grew up in. So we are trying to find that balance. And the city has gone through the hard work to really appreciate all the departments. You could tell how much time and energy they spent going through to kind of propose the minimum for today. And it's also challenging because costs are increasing, costs out of our control. I took a look at We have three fire engines in our budget. The cost of a fire engine has doubled since 2020, gone from 580 to over 1.1 million. Our insurance costs, as we mentioned, 6%, and double digits for software, and not to mention our inflation on everything else is 4.2% to date. So when we take a look at all those costs that are increasing significantly, not just inflation doubling, doubling for the cost for a lot of the construction costs too. I think the city is doing a darn good job of balancing those needs to keep the business going. This is what we're hearing from people. We need to have the run of the mill safety, fire, police, parks, PDS. We want to keep these things and it's harder to do that when we see all these costs increasing and going up double in five years. Not to mention on the flip side of that, we also are seeing the tools that we have to collect revenues to pay for these things Um, also decreasing, um, our liquor taxes have decreased and the mechanism that we collect those out of our control due to the legislature. And also with the house bill, um, having the ability for growth to pay for growth. And I appreciate all the cities are taking a look at that and commenting to the legislature to. For them to understand what that does to taxpayers. It's pushing costs. It's just pushing costs down, um, to the local municipalities. and for those taxpayers to cover those costs. So all that being said, I think we've done a good job balancing this budget and trying to find how do we continue to protect and recognize that our citizens are paying more and more for everything. And we wanna help them stay here and help decrease their costs and also continue to pay for the services we have. with the increased costs at the level that we're expecting. So I think, again, I think the city's doing a good job and I appreciate all the departments and the work that they did on their individual budgets. And Alicia, I appreciate you being the one being up here today to present to us. Thank you.

First of all, I just want to thank all the staff that's here today. This is, um, this is the all-star team. So thank you for being here. And I know that, uh, it takes a lot of work to put together the budget book. I do want to say, I really, really, really love the 4th of July. Thank you. Thank you for that. Uh, America 250. Thanks for, thanks for the city emphasizing all the good things that we've got going on. Um, You know, I've worked with budgets for a number of years and the purpose of these kind of budget meetings, and I think this is what our fourth or fifth, I mean, we've had quite a few, is for council and the public to understand the budget and then being able to then take this budget and take it to the public so that they can have a complete picture. This is what the city is asking for. And I appreciate folks' input Intention to speak with clarity because these things can get very wonky, but for the person that's paying the bill, they see the number. Two general questions or two general comments, I would say. I am concerned that. That in the quest to support good things, the city is creating a formula driven budget that doesn't allow for innovation and flexibility. So what I mean by that is when the city has an ordinance that says we're going to give this much of property taxes to public transportation, that sounds good. It gives, it gives consistency. It doesn't allow us to then use any sort of that money for flexibility or, or to look at greater needs. That is a done deal and that limits the ability of choices of people on the stand. And I know it's those formula driven budgetary items are there for a reason, but I would caution us to continue to do those things because it creates a system where you don't have very much flexibility. And you're left trying to figure out what's important with what's left when you spent everything else based on someone else's decision from before. As I said before, the purpose of this meeting is to understand the budget, get a complete picture. I'm going to vote for the budget to go to public hearing. I think it's important. People are paying attention. And here's what I'd like to hear from the public. The public lives in the world that we live in. They know the price of gas goes up, food's up, everything is up, and salaries don't necessarily keep pace with that. What I'd like to hear from Boiseans are, do you believe you're getting the value from this budget? If you think you're getting the value of what's been proposed, that's what I want to hear. And I really encourage people to attend the public hearing, tell us what you like, what you don't like, and recognize that it's your money. Thank you.

All right, clerk.

Morales.

Yes. Nash. Yes. Stead.

Yes.

Willits. Yes. Corliss.

Yes.

Halliburton. Yes. All in favor, motion carries.

Madam Mayor, we have a couple more of these. So the next motion is to refer... The following items for consideration of the public hearing set for July 14th, 2026, the recommendation to implement the proposed user fee increase of 5% or less to submit the proposed user fee greater than 5% in newly proposed fees as outlined on page 171 through 222.

I second the motion. We have a motion and a second. Clerk?

Morales. Yes. Nash. Yes. Stead.

Yes.

Willits. Yes. Corliss.

Yes.

Halliburton. Yes. All in favor, motion carries.

Madam Mayor, the next motion is to refer following items for consideration of the public hearing on July 24th, 2026, the proposed funding allocations for the fiscal year 2026 contingency accounts as outlined on page 110. I second the motion. Motion second. Clark.

Morales. Yes. Nash. Yes. Stead.

Yes.

Willits.

Yes.

Corliss.

Yes.

Halliburton. Yes. All in favor, motion carries.

And the Madam Mayor, my last motion is to refer the following items for consideration of the public hearing set for July 14th, 2026, the proposed fiscal year. Ooh, 20, yeah.

Yeah, 2022. Wait, 26.

20.

Fiscal year. There's a typo in the motion. 2027.

Okay, thank you. Sorry. Proposed fiscal year 2027, major equipment, major repair and maintenance, capital recommendations, and percent for art as presented, including the use of operating contingency for the operating impact of capital projects, if applicable and necessary, as outlined on page 163 through 167. Second motion.

We have a motion and a second. Clerk?

Morales. Yes. Nash. Yes. Stead.

Yes.

Willits. Yes. Corliss. Yes. Halliburton. Yes. All in favor of motion carries. Madam Mayor, there might be one more.

Yeah, that's what I was just pointing out just for housekeeping. It doesn't have a E after it, but I believe there's a final motion. Thank you, Madam Mayor.

The last motion is to refer all all other proposed budget amounts as presented for consideration at the public hearing except for July 14th, 2026.

Second the motion.

We have a motion. We have a motion and a second. Clerk?

Morales? Yes. Nash? Yes. Stead? Yes. Willits? Yes. Corliss? Yes. Halliburton? Yes. All in favor, motion carries.

All right. With that, I will adjourn. This says adjournment here. I'll adjourn our, we're not going to adjourn because we'll be back at noon. We're going to do what we usually do from a work session to a council meeting, and we will recess until noon and be back here for the council meeting. Thanks, everybody. Does it always say adjournment?

Okay. Right on time. Great, 10 minutes is up. Good choice. Good job. Good job. Good job. Good job. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. that was fine don't touch I do understand that certain things that I ask for are covered in different projects in there, so I went back to that. And I was ready. I was ready. I was ready. I was ready. I feel like you and I have so much in common. . . . . . Oh, I definitely would give it. It was such a disaster. But I think it was worth $2 based on the fact that I was in this one year. So I had five percent increase. It was so good. You guys know this? Yeah. Is that yours? Yeah. It's not everyone's own research. I'm sorry. Yeah, we are. Yeah. Okay, I will find that out for you. Thank you. All right. All right. All right. All right. All right. All right. All right. All right. I would say yes, because I did spread it around. So . . .

.

Okay. Okay. Okay. or you can

All right.

And then we also . Yeah, I should.

Yeah. Yeah.

So I will not ask her one because I don't care. They didn't have to. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. JPI has some ordinances to read for us. Read it quick and then it'll be over quicker. I was going to get my, I didn't know how you called it.

Bye. Okay. Thank you.

So we're going to have that in motion. Perfect motion. On C, it is supposed to be . My father.

Bye-bye.

Okay, you sent me a bunch of books that I wrote on a piece of paper that I can't find now. So I'm going to write it where I will. All right, we think we've lost. All right, we're gonna write it in this notebook.

Oh.

Yeah. Yeah.

Rob, we have to fix the motion.

We have to fix the motion. We don't have anything else to do.

It's gonna really be bad afterwards having to head back into a real job.

Do you have one? Now I'm down to one.

So yeah, so that's gonna be awesome.

I'll be multitasking there too with like a few of the funds that I get from the outside council.

Anything related to that special event?

No, not outside. We're still working on it. We're still working on it.

We're still working on it.

Yeah, I mean right. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

I know.

I know, actually, that's a really good question. Okay, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

Well, welcome back, everybody. We are now going to pick up our regular agenda meeting. Clerk, will you call the roll?

Corliss.

Here.

Halliburton. Here. Morales. Here. Nash. Here. Stead.

Here.

Willits. Here. All present.

Madam Mayor, I think a quick correction on a motion that was made in the last meeting during our work session. On the third motion made, which was to refer for consideration of the July 14, 2026 hearing the proposed funding allocations for the fiscal year 2026 contingency accounts. It should actually be the fiscal year 2027 contingency accounts. Just wanted to make that correction.

Okay. We don't need to vote.

Okay. Yes. Correct. Great. All right. Okay, now we'll take the minutes for approval.

And the Madam Mayor, I move approval of the council minutes from the work session and regular evening meeting on June 16th, 2026. I second the motion. And then Madam Mayor, I move approval of, oh, sorry, we have to vote.

I think that'd be a good idea. Clerk?

Morales. Yes. Nash. Yes. Stead. Yes. Willits. Yes. Corliss. Yes. Halliburton. Yes. All in favor, motion carries.

Okay, and then Madam Mayor, I move approval of the consent agenda. Second the motion.

We have a motion and a second. Clerk?

Morales? Yes. Nash? Yes. Stead? Yes. Willits? Yes. Corliss? Yes. Halliburton? Yes. All in favor? Motion carries.

And then Madam Mayor, moving into first reading, I ask unanimous consent that all ordinances on the first reading be read by name, read by number, and title only and filed for the second reading calendar. Without a

Objection. ORD-27-26, an ordinance CAR-25-25 for property located at 3099 West Moore Street, amending zoning classifications of the City of Boise City to change the classification of real property particularly described in Section 1 of this ordinance and adjacent rights of way from R-2 residential compact to MX-1 mixed-use neighborhood, setting forth a recent statement in support of such zone change and providing an effective date.

And then Madam Mayor, on to second reading. I ask unanimous consent that all ordinances on the second reading calendar be read by number and title only and filed for the third reading calendar.

Without objection.

ORD-26-26, an ordinance amending Boise City Code by striking Chapter 1, Article C, entitled Excessive Price Increases During Emergency, from Title 3, enacting a new Chapter 16, To title one, a Boise city code entitled excessive price increases during emergency, which contains the same provisions as the struck Boise city code, title three, chapter one, article C approving a summary of the ordinance and providing an effective date.

And then finally, Madam mayor, I move that further reading of. ORD 24 dash 26 and ORD 25 dash 26 be dispensed with and the record reflect. It has been read the third time in full.

Second, the motion. We have a motion and a second. Clark?

Morales? Yes. Nash? Yes. Stead?

Yes.

Willits?

Yes.

Corliss?

Yes.

Halliburton? Yes. All in favor, motion carries. ORD-24-26, an ordinance repealing and striking Boise City Code Title I, Chapter 16, entitled Emergency Temporary Suspension and Amendment of Provisions of Boise City Code, Title III, Chapter 3, Alcoholic Beverages, Title III, Chapter 4, Sidewalk Cafes, and Title V, Chapter 2, Section 10, Alcohol Open Container, approving a summary of the ordinance and providing an effective date. ORD-25-26 and ordinance CAR-25-15 for property located at 3412 and 3414 South Lindsay Avenue, amending zoning classifications of the city of Boise City to change the classification of real property, particularly described in section one of this ordinance and adjacent rights of way from I-1 light industrial to R-2 residential compact setting for the reason statement in support of such zone change and providing an effective date.

And then Madam Mayor, I move approval of ORD-24-26.

Second the motion. We have a motion and a second. Clerk?

Morales? Yes. Nash? Yes. Stead?

Yes.

Willits?

Yes.

Corliss?

Yes.

Halliburton? Yes. All in favor, motion carries.

Lastly, Madam Mayor, I move that R.D. 25-26 be approved.

Second the motion.

We have a motion and a second. Clerk?

Morales? Yes. Nash? Yes. Stead? Yes. Willits? Yes. Corliss? Yes. Yes. All in favor, motion carries.

Madam Mayor, if there's nothing further, I move that we adjourn. All in favor?

Aye.

We are adjourned. Thanks, everybody. See you all next week.

Oh, yeah.