City Commission - workshop

Commission budget workshop to order. Today is August 25th, 2026. It is 4.30 PM. Just as a reminder, we're going through the budget review process. Let's please stand for Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you. Okay, that was a nice reminder when I looked back and saw everybody standing. That was really nice, thank you. I apologize, I'm kind of running between meetings. So I know we've got our budget session today. I'm certain there's going to be a great presentation. I want to remind everybody, just a real quick reminder, we've been doing our budget road shows throughout the different districts. We'v

Devin, thank you for the very thorough presentation and for keeping it very simple for folks. So last night someone had asked a question regarding the audits. Can you just speak briefly to the audit? And I think also that maybe they alluded to a DOGE type of inspection, not just checks and balances. I wanna make sure we talk about the two different types.

Devin, thanks again. Wonderful. Now, this is sort of a little question I'm not sure you'll have off the top of your head. But is there a way to walk us through the timeline on FEMA funding that we've received and that we are expecting to see? And if or if not, that's included in any of the numbers in the presentation today?

Is there FEMA funding that we have received already or is that all in the future?

OK, that's good. And I want to ask this question. As far as you know, have we received any disaster relief from the county up to this point?

So I know some state funding probably gets redistributed through the county, is my understanding. So is it too hard a question? So what about county, state, federal hurricane recovery funding? Have we actually received anything from any of those?

okay yeah that does answer that question now there was a presentation earlier this year about the 880 ish million dollars that was given to the county to distribute and that we were hoping to get some of that money is can you give us an update on that and is any of that in these numbers

And that would be approximately $200 million distributed throughout the whole entire county then.

So it doesn't sound like out of it $800 million that we would end up with that very much of that being one city and many in the county or we're still hopeful.

So those type requests would be what type of things that we would possibly... We don't quite know. Oh, okay. Is it specifically supposed to be for then hurricane recovery or the money that they're talking about distributing?

Devin, can you walk us through the assessments that are sitting on our tax bill now that have been there since 2010? There's two waste, stormwater.

What's that? The variable. There's a fixed and a variable.

but I'd be happy to but yes that was for a capital project and that's what that second assessment is on your tax bill well I believe it started in 2010 with one and then it grew to I think 2012 it went into two okay and then it did a substantial increase a hundred and fifty percent increase in 2022 I can research that. So I'm just curious because I know with assessments, they're supposed to end at some point. They're supposed to be legally an end date to it. And we haven't even touched on that. I've got residents looking at increases on a lot of items and still fitting this bill on the tax rol

And I know a couple years ago, I don't think it was the last budget sessions we went through, but the year before that, we had talked about, there was a lot of talk about moving our money to higher yields, yield accounts. Have we done that?

And under department's general funds. I see city commission, the change is negative 17.4% and city manager at 4.7%. Question, Chair, on that. What all is involved in the city commission? I know that we've got our salaries here. Because if I count up salaries, it doesn't come anywhere close to $178,000.

I think you're referring to the $100,000. I think that might be a lobbyist fee.

Yeah. and I just other than those I just don't see I see everything else growing and I just don't see a lot of operational cuts at all on any of this I'm willing to give up our salaries if you can call them that I believe that would still need to be a referendum of the people

So I'm sorry. So the 110 for the lobbyists, can you explain that to me?

Okay. Devin and team, thank you very much. These are always good to see. I might echo a few comments, and then I have a few others as well. Commissioner Koshy mentioned the future FEMA reimbursements, so I as well would love to see what we've gotten so far in recent years. Obviously, don't go back 50 years of historic, but maybe last three or four or five years of fema reimbursements and anything that we have applied and or projected going out forward in what years they theoretically would come in i know none of that's guaranteed but just an understanding of where we've applied and might be ab

So theoretically, future years, more revenue coming from the fees, less fund transfers, I think we call it, right? Coming out of general, theoretically leaving more money in general for the other needs. And I would love to see that, you know, I know we're talking 27 budget now, so I realize that's our priority in the moment, but I would love to start seeing that project out, right? And so theoretically, our general fund should be um you know a benefactor in all of this work as well because we're no longer subsidizing the the enterprise funds accordingly i'd love to see how that starts to proje

Out of 159 FTEs currently, so like about maybe a 4% or something like that is kind of what I'm rough math thinking at. Might be off on that.

Yeah, so I don't know, is that, you say currently, six out of 159, so can we project that out annually? I don't know. What I'm really trying to get at, let me just cut to the chase of where I'm trying to go with this, right? So let's imagine that's 4%, but that's only a current slice of time, but across the year, maybe it's 8%, 10%, whatever the number is, right? So my question is, as we've talked about previously about software, for example, that might make our... gosh, are permitting a little faster, a little more efficient, things like that. We've talked about other operational efficiencies

Yeah, please, thank you. Hi, Ms. Schmidt. I might have missed it, and I know I see it in here quite a bit. I'll go to page, kind of hard to tell, I think it's page 22. Page 23 of 141, but it says 22 at the top. And maybe I'll just ask you, it's a fairly $20 million fiscal year 20 budget for non-departmental down to 6 million or 6.8 million. So number one, just help me understand non-departmental. What's kind of baked into that? Because that's a huge number to kind of just lump together.

Okay, so I'm sorry, I and I, I realize you're looking over maybe you got going through your head as I'm looking, I don't know where you're at in the presentation. So you mentioned a moment ago, We, last year, with 2026, we had, I wanna say five million was the number that you gave that you transferred out of general, presumably, into some enterprise fund, and because of the result of the fees that we've accrued, we are no longer sending that five million, theoretically, in our- Through the wastewater fund, that's correct. Wastewater. So, I just wanna make sure I understand. Were we subsidizing wastewater to the tune of $5 million in 2026?

Okay. And that will not be in 2027, right?

Okay. And that, interesting you just quantified for the purposes of capital projects. That doesn't necessarily imply that we were underfunding operations in those areas, but together with operations and capital projects that we would have liked to have done in 2026, we had to subsidize the uh wastewater wastewater fund from our general funds yes that's correct okay um okay um a general comment and and i uh i will tell you just for me thinking about it and i'm looking at these slides and and i don't have one specifically to draw you to but you know you kind of say uh well let me just let me jus

Yeah, I'll comment on myself. I think as I start to look back at where we've spent, what we budgeted, what we spent, what we're budgeting, what we anticipate spending, when you start commingling transfers with actual spending, I lose the ability. It becomes obfuscated, and I can't quite tell. So a general comment, as much as we can. Apologies, just another two. Commissioner Robinson asked about when do these assessments end? And yet all of us have those assessments sitting on our trim notice. Do we title those assessments? Like do we tell the property appraiser's office or the tax collector's

This fee expiry date, I assume they have a fixed duration usually. These are bonds that have a fixed duration, and they're meant to expire at a certain time. So if we title it with an expiry date, that might be something really good. We can say, oh, that is, and it expires in 2027, and here's what it's for, right?

Contemplate that, please. Let me see. This might be my last question, or I might defer. Let me see. City manager, maybe a question for you, ma'am. You mentioned the county program criteria for the grant request, the $200 million that Commissioner Causey asked about, and you said they haven't announced it yet. We're watching it. Do we have an anticipation of when they might announce it yet? We'll tell you about it in, I don't know, January of next year or something like that. Have they given you any indication?

They didn't provide, or can we ask and see if they've gotten information on it?

Understood. I get it. I wonder if they know and just haven't communicated yet or whether they don't quite know.

Obviously that, to Commissioner Causey's point, would be something barrier islands more affected. Theoretically we might have a chance at that pie. And obviously understanding when those dates are coming so we can all be weighted with bated breath would be good. Absolutely. Okay. Thank you. Appreciate your time. Two minutes off. City Clerk, I apologize.

Thank you. Thank you. With that, our City Commission Budget Workshop is adjourned.