City Council - workshop

Good afternoon. I would like to call to order the Hutchinson City Council budget study session September 10th, 2026. And before, I guess I need, I just need to basically start out with reading a statement. Before we get started, the City Council is aware that a number of union contracts remain outstanding, and we recognize both the importance and the time-sensitive nature of these issues. Our union employees deserve clarity and resolutions, and we do not take the delay lightly. I want to assure our workforce and the community that these contracts will receive the focused attention they deserve

And then before we get started on the actual budget study session, we as council need to make a motion to recess into executive session pursuant to the personal matters of non-elected personnel, exception KSA 75-4319, and in order to discuss matters The open meeting to resume in the City Council Chambers at 1 16 p.m. Second Before you vote, can you matters of what? Oh, sorry Just guess a personal matter non elected officials. That's the matter. We're gonna discuss So I just need a second second Yes

Okay, so we can get back to the budget discussion. I think Angela was the first one to come up, and I do know that we have to, with outside obligations for council and some of the staff, a hard stop at four. So just so everyone's aware.

So what does that take the airport's budget back to?

Because I think they were, what, 700, was that right, 700 and some thousand without that?

So the top of page 177 in the budget, it would go from 3.1 million budgeted to 176,000? Not to 176,000, but the net change to the general fund would be 176,000.

Oh, okay. I was looking at 177, which is the municipal airport fund.

And that was a position you already had currently? It's currently in the budget, yes. Yeah, and so basically we're just going back to add that position back in.

And so the savings that would have been seen by having that position not hired, but funded for this year, does the airport fund get to use those in a different way or how is that?

Okay. I think that would be something that I'd... in the absence of a city manager, I would be open to hearing how that could be used to better the airport or sweep it back to the general fund. I think either of those would be wise.

By losing that, how long have you been without that position?

Is that something that you could take? That was the question I had too, Mr. Chairman. Is that something that you could take the budgeted salary from your miscellaneous contractuals and use for that MRF? Because that's your MRF for 28.

And that would give you, I don't know what salary set aside for that position that wasn't filled is, but that would eat up quite a bit. I would imagine of what was left over and your new person's going to need supplies and whatnot. So is, is this amount here adequate for, what you're imagining they would need to accomplish next year?

And trading the FBO MRF equipment for your MRF equipment, I think, is a good tradeoff that if you're... I mean, that was $160,000 of MRF equipment. I would imagine that you prioritized the FBO stuff ahead of yours in this budget, considering that it was more timely. I don't know what page your other MRF projects are on. The field tractor was $80,000.

So right now, 24 foot mowers, like 34,000 is that that's the one, right? I'm sorry. What was that? The, the, the 20 foot mowers, like 34,000. That's the ones you're talking about in the Murph.

Correct. Yeah. Yeah. It's, we use the tractor for the big stuff. So you're probably talking 15 to 20,000, maybe 25 tops. Yeah. Okay.

The one 60 that we were cutting for the Murph and just put that towards your Murph would one 60 would cover everything that he's trying to get at the 80 for the field tractor, the 35 for the zero turn radius mower. And then you, you said another dollar amount for the flail mower.

Well, I think with the unknown of he doesn't have an exact dollar figure on the equipment, give him up to $160,000.

$25,000. I mean, $25,000 on that. Okay. Throw another $25,000 on there. Yeah, so it sounds like you're about right there.

All right, council, any other questions?

Sorry, what was our trend before 24? I'm sorry, I'm putting you in the spot probably.

This is the comp plan or the comp study that we did in 2024? Yes. Okay. And I recall doing it. And I recall the process. How far out did they basically project for our steps? You said that there was a while where there was no change to the top and bottom of the steps. Was that comp study in particular the one that changed the steps, or was that something else?

You said that two of the unions didn't prefer the way that the steps were, but that wasn't from our comp study from 25, was it?

So the wiggle room lies in the average merit raise. Okay. And shifting, so basically we have 4.5% to play with. The savings would vary because if the heavier part is the average merit raised, then that's the thing that would fluctuate. But if everybody gets the same COLA adjustment, then that's a set number and that would eat up that savings. So I guess the... It's hard to make a decision when we don't have, like, if there were a widget that we could slide around and say, here's how it saves. Give us a dollar figure.

So based off that information, Angela, is that something that you, because I know we had talked about this before, is that something, if we went to that two to two and a half, is that something you're comfortable with with our budget, with that number, or do we need to look at that a little bit deeper? Sure.

Yeah, and I'm not trying to discredit the staff because they are the backbone of our city, and so we want to make sure they're taken care of. However, I just want to make sure as a budgetary item that we're doing our due diligence to make sure Yes, we can sustain doing what we're going to do. So that's why I'm asking that question.

I think I would rather see it flipped and see a 2.5% COLA and a 2% average merit raised. I think that gives staff the assurance that they're valued and that they're – I mean, even that doesn't keep up with inflation, but it leaves less to the unknown because if the biggest part of your raise is guaranteed, I think that's the steps that – means we're negotiating in good faith.

The 2%, the 2.5 colon, the 2% merit, that still brings us down 1.5% from the 3.5% of the average merit. So heading into the 2028, your merit raise, because that's based off of their anniversary date, that's the one that's going to, I mean, the 2% is going to eat up less than the 3.5%. So I think that gives us a little more stability heading into 2028 also.

Yeah, I think that sounds like a really good idea on the way to approach that too. So you have any more comments on that part, this part? Council, any more questions on this part of it?

I know that Angela wasn't asking for specific motions on some of these items, but if everybody could just give a nod of consensus, that way she knows that this is how we want to move forward. Thumbs up.

Yeah, we probably need to keep some of that so we can hire out contractual type stuff. I do know that for sure. Um,

And I think when the city attorney position comes open and somebody is looking at it, if they know that they have a good cushion of contractual services that they can tap into, I think that makes the job easier. more palatable for, I mean, you don't have the person in your office, but you have someone that you can call and reach out to for all of that stuff. That makes sense. And if we don't use it, we don't use it.

Because we've got – I was trying to find that. We've got about, what, $7.5 million in the current stormwater fund?

And so we do – it's not like we don't have some money there to use for that. So then basically you'd be – okay.

Yeah, for the historical stormwater commitment, which is the one with the limited scope.

How did you, so on those allocations of Golf Street, General Parks, how did you come up with that determination of why those amounts for those specific line items?

Okay. So the $418,000 transfer to the Gulf, is that the operations transfer? Okay. And it's 419, is that the annual transfer that offsets operations?

And you can't use any of that money to build back up the reserve fund, though, can you?

Well, I know Stacey brought up in the last meeting talking about the length that we could operate off of what our reserve was. And so that's why I was looking at going, that would be a way to build that back up. But I just didn't know if that was something we could do or not.

I think that's the ghost of Paul Brown in the room, and he intentionally worded it in a way that it would give us some freedom if we needed it. But it was worded in a way that people understood it easily, and they could say predictably, these are the three things that I'm saying my city should prioritize. I think that as the public has become more aware of the financial situation of the city, putting it in the reserves is something that absolutely makes sense for us. It would help. I mean, it would raise our reserve by almost 50%. So the $1 million. So I think that would be a smart move. Becau

Okay, got it. So we could still do one million into the reserves and then have up to $974,000 to play with. knowing that the So later on one of the things that that I know we'll talk about is the golf course master plan and The idea there is that we would basically, instead of doing two phases this year, we could do one. Last year, we did not fund a phase. So the work that was completed at the golf course last year is what was funded in 25. So in 27, there would really not be any work done at the golf course because we didn't fund it in 26. I think this 418 to golf, yes, we're transferring out

And so this money is all going towards operations then, correct?

Correct. So on paper, at the end of the day, if we're doing 418 to golf to offset operations and then we're doing one phase of the golf course master plan on paper, it's still going to look like we're giving $600,000-ish to the golf course. And that's a cut of quite a bit because the CIP for the golf course is, I think, 600 even.

Yeah, I think it was like $660,000 or something like that.

Yeah. Yeah, $660,000. But, I mean, the difference is one is for operations and the CIP was for master plan projects.

So is that something you were okay leaving that?

I feel like we don't really have a choice.

Yeah, that's kind of what I think, too, because it's more of an operational thing, not a...

I mean, it does keep $418,000 in the general fund by taking it from the sales tax. The thing I would like to see... increased as the streets part. Sorry.

Thanks, Justin. Council, do you have any other questions for Angela on this item, if this is the direction we wanted to go?

I would like to see the streets section increased. I know that that's something that we as a council get a lot of feedback and criticism on, but it's also very important just for regular maintenance and maintenance. The brick streets was cut from the 27 budget entirely. We still set aside a very small amount that we always do, but brick streets as a line item as a project was removed from the 27 budget, right?

Right, I agree, and I think that that's not something that I... know how to make that decision. I think giving them money and letting them decide what's most appropriate would be the best avenue.

Yeah, I think it's something we need to look at too because I know the brick streets are kind of cool, but it's just so costly to actually do the brick versus the asphalt.

If that's the case, I would rather kick it a year and take that $100,000, if that's what it is, and put it into fixing it correctly instead of wasting that money.

Is it something that we could do $100,000 this year and with the understanding that work won't be done on the brick streets, but that that would be banked for the next year?

With the 25K that's been continuously put in? Yeah. And I know it doesn't go far, but I think if we did this small amount this year and then next year we would increase it, I think it at least gives you a tiny bit in the bank.

I like that idea better of pushing that money onto the next year if we can do that. It sounds like a good idea.

Well, and if we're just making the adjustment within the $974,000 figure I guess we have to figure out what are we taking it from or are we going to adjust it and take it out of the 1 million that we're putting into the reserves? Because if we're staying within the nine 74 We've already heard about the golf fund, but we haven't heard anything about the park operations amount, and that's the largest item on there. That would be the one I would imagine we're pulling from. And Brick Streets was also just one of the options that Angela mentioned the other one that I wrote down was sidewalks. Our s

Would that be, is that salaries or is that projects or?

So is that something you could pull $50,000 out of each and transfer out? I know this is catching you off guard, but just asking.

So, Scott, are you thinking that instead of 418, it would be 368 on the top line?

Yeah, if that's how the allocation would work. If he came back and said, yeah, no, I really would rather you pull 60 out of this one or 40 out of this one just to kind of – or maybe that's not – I don't know. That's what I was thinking, too. So I'm just throwing out a number, just kind of like you're not sure either.

Because basically it's us asking, is that something you could pull, say, $50,000 out of each? If not, we'd have to go back to what we're shifting to the general fund to go, no, it needs to come from there. It's just an ask, I think, more of a question.

So I think, I was thinking of it a different way. It's not asking you to cut the 50 from your budget. It's just saying that, You would still get that from the general fund. It's just saying that the storm or the sales water tax wouldn't offset your request by that amount. So you would still be able to request the 490. It's just that it wouldn't go from here to here to here. It would just go to here, and then yours would be 450 instead of 490. Yeah.

So you're not being asked to cut 50K from a budget that we literally just threw at you like five minutes ago or idea we just threw at you five minutes ago.

Yeah, I think I was going the wrong direction with that. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah, that was kind of my biggest goal, too, was just to get that fund balance back up because of the comments Stacey made. And our other meeting is like going, okay, so what do we have to do to make that happen? Because overall, to me, that's kind of an important goal. I think that's your direction, I guess. Sorry, I took you down the wrong path.

Okay. Before we move on, can we just spit all those final numbers? It was 368 to golf, 160 to streets, and 450 to park operations. Is that still...

So if we took $50,000 from golf and $50,000 from park operations, as Justin said, the golf operations is usually in the $200,000 to $250,000 range, and that the $418,000 was really conservative. And again, this isn't asking him for a cut. This is just shifting what fund it comes from, then you could do 160 for streets, taking 50 from golf and park operations.

And in talking with Cecil, that in the, hold on, let me get to the right page. In 2027, if we took- What page is that on? Oh, 460. In the CAP, yeah. So that would, this was the project that he had talked about, and he can come up and speak to it if he's in here. Oh, there he is. This would be increasing our contractual commitment But basically, we're getting the job done, and we're kind of front-loading the work and the understanding that we would eventually bring it in-house. Can we talk about this?

And is it the product that as it wears off, there's other reflective stuff underneath it?

Sorry. Sure. No, I so if we if we didn't spend that 100 the extra hundred this year, I mean Do you think you'll have your melter up by next year to where we could actually use that money to actually doing it in-house versus contracting out so it would be more beneficial to us so you can put more money towards that or no?

Because we've got $150,000 for $27,000 and then $250,000 for $28,000. When you hire a contractor for the year, how much can they get done doing that type of work?

So $150,000, how many linear? I'm just a guess. Just throw a dart at the board.

No, I understand. I'm not asking for a hard number. I was just kind of an idea. Because, I mean, I would rather, I don't know, I'd rather push that off, adding the $100,000 to that and pushing it off a year maybe. I don't know. It's just me thinking, the general fund as well.

I feel like we've made, we've found savings in other areas that... yes, we could potentially push this off, and yes, there's some efficiency in having your own machine, but I hear what Cecil's saying as a cry for help, that we are so far behind that we will never get caught up, and yes, I could buy my own machine, but buying my own machine and doing it in-house is an eight-year project, whereas hiring a contractor to do it for two years and take a huge bite off of it makes it a four-year contract or a four-year project once we get our own machine. So I feel like, and correct me if I'm wrong, b

It seems like your staff would be pretty busy with, as we do get the machine and we start doing things in-house, it seems like you would stay pretty busy with with the restriping after the arterial maintenance program runs through each summer.

I can live with that. You said that, Greg, about people talking about our striping in town, and I've heard that too.

And then if you have a warranty issue, you're waiting on the contractor to come back and send someone to look at it, and then your project manager is tied up taking pictures for the warranty work. If it's our guys, you just send the crew over to take care of it, and then it's done, and you're not waiting until the next season to fix the things that went wrong on last year's project. Yeah, absolutely. I think there's a lot of efficiencies in having our own staff work on that stuff.

I know that in talking to department heads about this, it's very beneficial for us to have those positions. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I think we contractually with, to like outside firms, I think we saved about $360,000. Is that about correct?

So I think that was in the talking of like, we're moving away from not moving completely, but as much as we can, because you look at that savings, we can put that and have that in house. And then sometimes talking to staff too is like, sometimes when you have somebody not in house you lose some translation. So sometimes it takes longer to get to where we need to get to that. It costs us more.

And I think by adding those two, I know there's some work that we need to get done, and we can't do that because of this as well. So, I mean, it's something that I'm totally in agreement and moving forward with this.

I think that when we raised our water rates in 2026, part of that was the promise of delivering better services and addressing aging infrastructure. And without the engineers on staff, We won't be able to accomplish those things as quickly. So I fully support this. I'm glad that we talked about this. I think this is going to help get us ahead. And hopefully we don't have a backlog to work through. But I know there's a lot of projects in the pipeline with utility and water. And hopefully planning and zoning is going to be busy with some kind of boom soon too. So yeah, I think this will be reall

Do you know what page that's on in the budget?

I know that Cecil and I have had lengthy conversations about this machine, and I think starting on working on parking lots and a way for us to – I know we talked about doing on the – I know we talked about on, like, the Martinez Trail. the concrete option versus the asphalt option and I know the concrete option is going to be a lot more expensive but where we have this machine and we have the staff to learn how to use it and everything else I think it's I was really pushing back on this machine and the more we've talked through it I think the more it makes sense but I do want the rest of council to weigh in on this too because I didn't think it was a necessary thing we needed to have and one question you asked me that I did find out there is a possibility for anyone

And I know that the other question was too, I I'd made was the, the size of roller we had in house to be able to use, to, to, coincide with that? And I question, like, do we have a big enough machine? And you came back with what your information was on.

I think that I remember the parking lot and the Jim P. Martinez savings, and I feel like right off the bat, you have a third of it paid for in savings just on those two projects alone. I understand they're multi-year projects, but I think that's a significant savings that justifies the machine and all the things that go with it.

And, again, if we can learn how to use it and we save that 25%, 30% of hiring outside entities, I think that's a smart move as well. I forgot about how much we were going to save on those two projects, too. Again, there's been some good conversations about it because I was not for it in the beginning at all. So thank you, Cecil.

You got it with 277? Should be 260. Huh? Oh, 260,000.

Sorry. Sorry. Was there any type of grant money or anything for this project?

Not on this one. And I know we've had conversations about this, that it does bring people to our park and town to – because it's kind of like not very – I mean, it's pretty unique, I guess, for what I'm trying to say. And so I agree with that, but then I'm like going – I look at it and go, well, could we spend that $260,000 somewhere else or build something back up? So that's my two cents about it. I'm not a bike guy. I mean, I bike, but not – that type of bike. That's not my type of skill set. I think that's Stacy's skill set.

I don't know. I just wanted a conversation about it.

So what you're saying, just so... To kind of summarize what you're saying is removing this project from the budget doesn't actually save us $260,000 because it would be bonded and it wouldn't necessarily just come out of the budget for this year anyway.

Well, I know we were kind of pushing a little bit, too, to actually, I won't say quit bonding so much, but to where we can pay some of this out of cash. Is that even an option to do that, to where we wouldn't have to bond something like this for 20 years, to where we could just say you pushed it a year and it could pay cash for it? I'm just asking a question. I know we'd kind of been trailing that way a little bit, but I didn't know if that was something we're going to get into deeper going forward or not.

I will say that I think it was in March I mentioned, I don't remember what month it was actually, but I mentioned the transient gas tax that we would be able to go from Based on the state statute, we'd be able to go from the 7% that we're at now up to the 9%. And when I brought it up, we didn't have time to dig into it because it was the middle of budget season. So I know that that's a conversation that we're going to eventually pick up. And my rough estimates on that is it brings us about a quarter of a million dollars in And it's something that we would plan to sunset after the second golf c

We may have been at one time, but we're not right now. We're not currently. A lot of municipalities like up by Kansas City just did it in advance of the World Cup. And they got a good amount of money from it.

Yeah. So are we in agreement that we're going to move this?

Justin, what's the final year of the master plan? Because our CAP only shows to 2030.

So 10, 11, 12, is it more irrigation related or is it more...

So is that, are they having a ton of issues with them?

I don't know. I'm a golfer and I know what the revenue generation is for the course and I know how much pushback we had because of what we spent last year. That's my only pause. That's just my two cents on that. If the irrigation system was in disarray and it couldn't operate, stuff like that, maybe I'd have a different opinion on that. But that's kind of where I'm at with this part of it. So that's just my two cents.

I know it's, it's, it's one of those things where we spent that money last year and we got kind of the pushback to go, maybe if we push it another year, we would get, I know it's, I know exactly what you're saying.

This is one that I would like to see cut. half it just seems like there's a lot going to the golf course when we consider the offsetting of the budget this and then the the water reuse project that we haven't talked about I mean that's a lot of money that's going to the benefit of a golf course that I know people use it, and it brings people from out of town potentially, but overall it is not a moneymaker for the community, and I know that municipal golf courses aren't, but this is something that I would definitely cut in half.

But I don't know that you could actually do this cut in half to achieve what you're trying to do.

Oh, I got you. Okay, I understand. Okay, I understand.

So you would have no construction in 2028? Correct. Okay, because we're already not doing anything in 27 because we didn't fund it in 26. So you would have two years of non-construction, but you would be banking that 330. Correct. So then in 29, when that came...

Yeah. Then you would have your full 660.

Which it will be more than 660 at that point, but just the nature of it.

What if you just, I know this is not part of your golf master plan, but what if you just redid the irrigation on those instead of doing anything with the teas or the greens or any of that stuff? I know it's going to get away from your zoysia conversion. It's just a question.

But you could do that in stages, though. That you go, hey, we're going to replace 10 green or whatever, and I'm just spitballing.

I think David was going to give us some insight on that.

Yeah, I mean, because it's kind of an important thing, too.

Because how much we're paying for the water currently, you explained that as well too.

Yeah, and so the only reason I had you come back up, too, to give us more insight on that was because the explanation I received was if we don't get the overlap, then the other project just goes away.

And so that's the only reason I'm willing to explore this is to go, if we can get X and we can do this, then I'm willing to. And then at that point we can actually look at it and go, then we can decide at that point if we want to do it, yes or no. That's correct. We're still not committed to it.

And I think this number may not be right. Is it 660,000 gallons? What is that number of use?

I knew it was somewhere in that range, and I just wanted to let go. If we get this, it's a depletion of the aquifer that we're not depleting of 400-some thousand gallons of water a day.

It's just something that I would like to look at and we're not committed to.

And this SRF loan is not going to take away from any of the other projects of water going to homes in our town?

Right. And we've already done some work towards this.

Oh, so it's across all of those? Yeah. Okay. So it's not just specifically this project only? That money isn't spread across?

So, and this would probably be for Justin too, but so McQueen Fields is just north of the golf course. I don't know what hole that is. The east side of the golf course. And then there's a playground right in the middle of there. It's the blue and green ones, two to five. Would you consider irrigating around that playground?

So I think that the thing that catches me up is still simply that this is, I mean, it's still $5 million and I get that it's not directly coming out of the general fund. It's not Not doing this project might not increase our reserves, but this is still a lot of money for a 20-year payout. Spending five saves us $2 million over 20 years. I mean, I know everybody else on the council is for it. I'm still not really in favor of this. And I get that there are safeguards in place and guarantees that it wouldn't be used for what it's not being said it's used for. And you know I love the parks. I love

I think staff, sorry, I'm not trying to. I think staff is just asking for the opportunity to at least try it. And if that, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. And then at that point we could still, if you go, hey, it's still not good for me or a council or a community, then we can shoot it down at that point too.

Yeah, because we're spoiled now and we don't know what the future brings.

Okay. Great. Council have any other questions for any staff or anything?

I do want to just touch on what Greg just said. Yeah, if we're looking at how many employees do we have year to year. But I don't think that that's really what you judge government efficiency or a good budget on by any means. All that is is one lag measure showing you how many people you have working for you. And I think the most important thing is Are we delivering the services that we promised? Are we maintaining a good budget? And are we helping our residents live the quality of life that we're promising they should have and could have in our city? And I think at the end of the day, that's

All right. If there's nothing else, thank you, Angela. Thank you, old staff, for what you brought to us.