The town of Mancos is putting the finishing touches on the 2016 budget before it comes to the town board of trustees for introduction next week.
According to the tentative budget presented at an Oct. 7 town board workshop, estimated total revenue is slated to come in about $1.2 million, a 15 percent uptick from 2015, which is a fairly conservative estimate, explained town administrator Andrea Phillips.
The town would also start the year with a beginning fund balance of $675,883, bringing the total proposed fund balance to roughly $1.9 million.
“We do have some concern about the mineral lease and severance tax, which is based on the industry. It’s taken a downturn, and there will be an impact to us,” Phillips said. “Annual revenues less expenses, we’re dipping into reserves about by about $61,000, but that still leaves a pretty healthy fund balance.”
“We control expenditures throughout the year, and usually bring in more revenue than anticipated.”
Proposed expenditures are estimated to be about $1.2 million for 2016.
Among those proposed expenses is a new deputy marshal to assist the law enforcement department of three, including Marshal John Cox, with patrolling, as Cox reports an uptick in calls for service and strained schedules for his existing deputies. At an Aug. 5 budget workshop, Cox inferred that there was a correlation between the increase in calls for service to the availability of retail marijuana in town limits.
He cited 417 calls for service in 2012, 447 in 2013, 675 in 2014, and 425 calls in the first six months of 2015.
“I’ve heard that because there’s a cheap place to stay, and since some don’t have driver’s licenses, they can walk to the marijuana shops,” he explained, at the Aug. 5 meeting. “I’m against marijuana because it eats up the mind. I don’t think it’s the worst thing in the world, but it is causing us problems.”
If approved by trustees, the new deputy marshal would start in April of 2016, saving the town a full year of salary initially. The expense for the deputy for 2016 would be $61,982 with recurring cost of $76,569.85.
To fund the position, trustees are considering to raise the town’s marijuana transaction fee from $2 to $3.
The increase is projected to bring in an additional $60,000 annually.
Town clerk Heather Alvarez also noted that the town would be applying for a grant next year to assist with costs associated to the new deputy.
“I’m not opposed to raising it (transaction fee),”said Trustee Queen Barz. “I think we need to take care of our town…it’s (retail marijuana) added extra work and expenses for the marshal, extra cost to a lot of citizens.”
The town is also considering eliminating the part-time position of economic development coordinator, and using $10,000 of the $20,800 used to fund the position for marketing, and a $2,500 for the Mancos Public Library. As library leadership explained at the Sept. 23 board meeting, the entity struggling with declining revenue and ballooning debt.
While trustees agreed that current economic development coordinator Chelsea Jones has done a lot with the fairly nebulous position since it was established two years ago, some questioned whether or not the funds would be better spent elsewhere if economic development was handled internally by town administrator Phillips.
“When we created position, it was a compromise and highly argued by former board member… but without having much of a marketing budget, it’s hard for an economic development coordinator to do much,” said mayor Rachael Simbeck.
Simbeck also suggested the town shift its economic development focus from business recruitment to promoting itself more as a tourism destination, since the industry in southwest Colorado, and throughout the state, is booming.
Trustees are also mulling the possibility of eliminating the inactive fee for water and sewer, and charging the base minimum to all inactive accounts every month. Currently, the inactive fee is $10 per month.
If approved, the elimination of the inactive fee program would bring in $31,280 annually.
“The inactive fee is way less than the cost of actually getting water treated, distributed and to the tap,” said Phillips. In-town water customers are slated to see a $2.50 increase in January, a bump approved in early 2015 to pay for water infrastructure upgrades.
“Right now we’re trying to rebuild our water infrastructure that’s been ignored for the last 30 years, and one of reasons why is things like this (fee program). I think we need to fix our infrastructure,” said trustee Stone.
The 2016 budget is up for introduction on October 14, at which time trustees can make additional adjustments.
Per state law, the final budget must be adopted by the board, by Dec. 15.