City budget would boost employees, taxes

COEUR d'ALENE - City officials said Tuesday that a growing Coeur d'Alene requires an increase in property taxes and personnel.

Finance Director Troy Tymesen presented the preliminary city budget for the upcoming fiscal year during an afternoon workshop with the Coeur d'Alene City Council in the library community room. The addition of approximately 26 full and part-time employees to the city's payroll, as well as an initial proposal of raising property taxes by 2.75 percent, were the most widely discussed portions of the budget.

"The model that we have as a city is that, if you do not grow, you either cut services or you take the 3 percent (maximum amount an Idaho city can raise property tax annually)," Tymesen said. "You've done a really good job of having multiple business lines upon which you can generate income to help offset raising taxes."

Tymesen added that other cities in Idaho cannot afford to not take the maximum property tax increase each year because they lack the growth seen in the Lake City.

"That's why I am so excited about this financial plan," he said, referencing the number of new employees included in the plan, and the fact that the city was not asking for the full 3 percent increase.

Councilman Dan Gookin said the proposed increase was understandable given the hiring the city planned to do, a majority of it in the realm of public safety. However, Gookin added that he would like "to be sensitive" of residents living on fixed incomes when working with a property tax increase.

"I would like to see a little more effort done to get our property tax down," he said.

Mayor Steve Widmyer agreed with Gookin's notion of attempting to lower the property tax increase.

"We can do a lot of numbers," Tymesen said. "But until we get a flavor that you're willing to take a property tax increase, we're really going to struggle. I could close you and suggest that we will make a 1.75 percent happen."

With support from the council, Tymesen said his department would rework the proposed budget using a 1.75 percent increase in property tax rates in the city. Anything lower would require cuts to the budget, he added.

The list of proposed new personnel, which Tymesen said is the largest requested addition in memory, includes:

* Nine firefighters

* Six police officers

* One fire division chief

* Part-time civilian report taker (CDAPD)

* Part-time crime prevention position (CDAPD)

* Part-time animal safety officer (CDAPD)

* Part-time code enforcement (CDAPD)

* Electrical inspector

* Building permit coordinator

* Two utility water workers

* Administrative support in the Water Department

"This is the year of public safety; you've shared that with us through strategic planning," Tymesen told the council. "We have public safety heavily emphasized in our full-time equivalencies."

Many of the city's department heads were in attendance at the meeting and given the opportunity to answer questions from the council about why the city needs additional employees.

Water Superintendent Jim Markley, whose department is requesting three new employees, told the council that he could double the productivity of his utility workers by adding two employees and splitting the crew in two.

"We have over 18,000 utility services in the city, that's quadrupled in the last 30 years," Markley said. "We're looking to add that personnel so we can get to about 2.5 miles of replacement per year on water mains."

Markley added that his department is requesting additional administrative support to handle the increase in data input that has come as a result of the city's growth.

Tymesen said the next step in the budget process is going before the council during its meeting on Aug. 3 to ask for approval on a resolution setting a high-water mark for the budget. This mark, Tymesen said, establishes a dollar figure that cannot be exceeded as the overall budget develops throughout the year.