Hopkinsville Committee of the Whole voted Thursday night to forward the $36.7 million balanced operational budget for Fiscal Year 2019-2020 to Hopkinsville City Council.
Mayor Carter Hendricks said the $36.7 million budget is an increase of just over $942,000 from the previous year and added that most of the increase is being driven by the rising pension costs to the city. He also noted the budget does not include any prior year revenue.
The property tax, Hendricks explained, they are assuming the 4% growth of revenue collected that is allowed by the state.
He added that there is no tax rate increases are proposed in the budget, the only one that they would consider is if they had to come back to the council in August and September would be the property tax and at that time they would make that decision.
Hendricks said the payroll tax revenue is budgeted at a 1% growth factor.
The operational budget also includes a not cost of living increase for employees, no special projects, a 5% cut to agencies, and a 4% cut to Community and Development Services. During his department’s presentation, Director Steve Bourne said with the cut they are looking at the loss of two employees in their Planning Department, which is about $40,000, a significant amount.
The committee approved sending the budget to city council by a vote of 11-1 with Councilman Darvin Adams the lone nay vote. Adams had expressed his concern at the end of the department presentations that Inner City REZ was taking the biggest cut of all the agencies. The agency’s $500,000 budget was cut by $100,000, but Adams was assured by committee members and city officials Inner City REZ should not be impacted because in the past they have only used about $400,00 of their budget.
The budget will be on the Hopkinsville City Council agenda for the May 21 meeting.
