Remarks by Sanquetta Cowan-Williams
111 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 3 of 5
- Play at 1:11:20
“I just have one more question. Up here at the top where it says 3% cost of living increase and a 2.5% performance increase. Does that mean that they're going to automatically get this or? We're just putting it in there.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:13:15
“I'm just trying to look at this see what we can cut for some things we know that's important because Again, these street signs is important to me, and it's a safety net. If we can back some money out from somewhere, I know we're saying we're going to look at this, but this is during our budget time that we need to look to see. Because, yes, everybody has to tighten up their budgets. And being accountable for the funds that we're spending, there are some things that really I think is important that we need to look at. if we can cut back. I know these are some numbers that you all have given…”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:16:52
“But that's the new position. That's the minimum, the minor. I mean, the minimum is $85,000.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:17:29
“That's just the salary, not including the benefits?”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:19:01
“So what happened with that position being funded in the budget?”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:19:21
“because I didn't even know how I've been asking how much that position makes and so how I mean that so that's why I'm asking now because I know the position did not come before the commissioner approved and so I was wondering where we get the funding out and see it in here will begin the funding from with this additional position is not addition is the same position.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:19:56
“In the budget, OK. Okay, on this page where we are, where it says cemetery fund, it says on that same one where we're talking about, we're on the same page, we're down to the bottom, where it says cemetery fund. So it says we budgeted $157,000 and the proposed budget amount for $156,000. So we're saying that's how much the cemetery is going to bring in? Correct. So if we bring, I guess I'm trying to understand, if we bring in 158,000, over the last five years, how much has gone out that we're in the red? And we've been asking, and I know I've asked that a study be done on this with the…”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:22:58
“But what was the expenditures, though, for the cemetery so far? You gave us how much they brought in so far. What's their expenditures so far?”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:23:24
“the expenditures look like for the cemetery. Oh, they're here.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:24:17
“What's the salary of the person for the cemetery? Is this $85,000? No, there are two people out there.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:24:40
“There's three people out there, but I'm just saying what's coming out of the cemetery. I'm just saying, what's the salary of the two people that's out there?”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:25:14
“That's what increased those. And so I know we do have the Henderson Fund that we all talk about that I haven't really ever got a clear understanding on it. And so they say we can't use any of this bond for the cemetery, but we're supposed to be able to use the interest or something. How much interest is coming in over the past five years that you've seen that contributes that we can use to contribute to the cemetery?”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:25:55
“So let me ask a question because I was reading with the different job description. As the finance director, you are able to invest the city's money. Correct. With this Henderson Dow, are we able to, if we see that we're not getting a good interest rate on this, I don't know anything about the fund, but are you able to find out information to find out if what we've been doing is not working, that we can invest it in another way so that we can be able to get other funds since we can't touch the actual funding and we can only touch the interest rate?”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:27:17
“Yes. Yeah, that's what I'm asking. But since I know you, you know, as the finance director says that you, you know, can research and look at and bring it back to us and explain to us what your research, what you found that, you know, because of this, we've only been getting this because that's what I'm starting to look at. you know, with how we have our money invested and what do we have, because we're supposed to get a report monthly on our money that's invested and how it's doing and how it's invested, where it's invested at, so we can look to see how we can get more bang for our bucks for…”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:28:15
“Because we don't want to continue to look at going in debt each time and each time the auditors come and we are in the red each time. So that's why I'm saying look at doing something different.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:29:19
“Because it's been sitting there for some years now.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:31:25
“And I have a couple more questions on the pages that we're on. So where it says under general fund, transfer out, is that money that we're putting, where it says transfer in and transfer out. So just looking at the marina, transfer in, we budgeted $377,000 and last year that was what and this year and then I see we have those parentheses around what what does that mean when you say transfer in”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:32:42
“So, for his revenues for the marina, we're saying we're bringing in, well, we said we budgeted $216,000 last year, proposed budget today. 198,000 and we've only brought in 17,000. Is that what we're at? 17,202. That's the variance. That's the variance. Yeah, for the marina.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:33:31
“But they're not bringing in enough to with their expenditures. No, they're not. And with the marina being I know we had lights and water up there and we don't have I'm just trying to figure how much our what's the expenditures.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:34:24
“Okay so my question is and I think this has come up before for more revenue we're in the budget year so you get phone calls, people come in on the weekend on Fridays because they know we have nobody at the marina. They stay up there and leave early Monday morning because they know that, um, you know, that's when the people come back to work. Are we looking at doing something different in order to bring revenue into the marina? Because if you got someone coming up there on a Friday, they stand up there all weekend. I mean, if they're going to be doing that, are we looking at where we can have…”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:37:17
“So my next question is, you say the clerk is up there. Is that impacting our budget? Because now she's working outside of being the city clerk. And she's now. No, it's not the city clerk. They're individual. That's the marina clerk. That's the marina clerk.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:38:13
“That's my concern because you're saying someone is up there. Right. Listen, people have come to say, look, these people up here. And you can go up there and talk to the people. And they say, oh, nobody is here. So, you know, we figured it's open on the weekend. It's open. So. and not there on Sundays. And so if she wasn't there when they came, you know what I'm saying? I don't know if she's walking to see if the people are there or not. And so we're losing money is what I'm saying.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:40:08
“So we don't lose money, and when we're looking at our budget every year, we're trying to keep it.”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:41:14
“I do. I have one more question. I'm going to go to Parks and Recreation because I know this was a concern for me. Let me find out what Parks and Recreation are in here. Now, I know last year we had no money, revenues coming in from Parks and Recreation, so I went through all of this and I can't remember everything. I'm just trying to see Do we have funds for coming in this year? Because I know we do have games. And that was a concern of ours that we were supposed to be going moneyless. And we were supposed to have been getting these little machines and all of this because we said there were…”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026
- Play at 1:43:33
“So my question is, yes, we're going cashless, but still, what accountability system are we going to have in place that each person that comes in to make sure, little Ray Ray can come in, oh I don't have no money, you come on through. So what account, we're gonna have an accountability system in place for each person that comes in. So like if you come in this week, We giving out a blue bracelet and they wanna go back out and they say, oh, I left my bracelet or whatever and I don't have my bracelet. Are we gonna have a system in place being accountable for that even though we're going cashless?”
City Commission · Jul 17, 2026