BUDGET: Deficit reduction for Coeur d’Alene

A search of the City’s 2025 audited financial statements for “annexation fee funds” produces no answer. Where are these “funds”?

Such funds are generally money collected to be used for infrastructure on properties a city has annexed as part of a master plan real estate development. They are often restricted in use by agreements with developers or under grants which contribute the money. CDA might transfer such money to its operating fund but if the “annexation fee fund” may have a future claim for the transfer. CDA then has not “saved” money, it has a debt the operating fund will have to pay in the future.

 The City has various “unearned income” accounts, which indicates the City has not fulfilled its legal obligations to take possession of that money. Is this where the “annexation fee funds” are located? 

Capital expenditures (trucks) under GAAP are capitalized and depreciated over their service life. Delaying an expenditure does save cash in the current period but the impact on a “deficit” (current expenses in excess of current income) is only annual depreciation, not the original cost of the asset. The total cost delayed is ~$150K. Annual depreciation (over 7 years) is ~$20K, so the real effect on the deficit in 2027 is not $150K but $20K. “Savings” are overstated by ~$130K. To say otherwise is financial illiteracy or deception.

The ~$928K “savings” the City claims is at least overstated/mischaracterized, perhaps considerably.

CDA Press needs to ask some questions to aid transparency.

G.H. SCHIRTZINGER

Hayden