Pedestrian safety, ballfield enhancements, a new city planner, tax relief for seniors and fire department training are among the items included in the city’s proposed budget for next year.
The city commission met Monday night to further discuss the 2026 budget and set a public hearing in early September to adopt it.
The proposed budget can include an increase of up to 1 mill, bringing the maximum mill levy to 40.038. Interim City Manager Zack Daniel said he is not expecting the mill levy to change by a whole mill, but still plans on having the new city planner budgeted to start in January and the other plans discussed by commissioners.
The final proposed budget will be presented to the commission on Aug. 25. The commission has had several meetings to discuss the budget over the spring and summer.
Daniel shared other projects previously discussed as part of the proposed 2026 budget, like compensation adjustments, a new planner, deputy court clerk and $125,000 to support economic development.
The budget also includes $40,000 encumbrance for fire department apparatus replacement plan, $457,000 to support street repairs, the pavement management program and other capital projects, and $20,000 to continue the city property tax relief program for senior citizens and disabled veterans.
Other capital improvement projects are as follows:
Parks & Rec
- Gym roof repairs ($10,000)
- Ballfield enhancements ($20,000)
- Parks maintenance, master plan enhancements ($60,000)
Public Safety
- Police patrol car ($43,000)
- Police equipment ($25,750)
- Fire training center development ($28,550)
- Fire vehicle – fully outfitted ($64,510)
Streets/Roads
- Pavement management program ($610,000)
- Annual chip & seal ($115,000)
- Curb replacement ($99,000)
- 10th Street pedestrian safety ($160,000)
Included in the water utility fund is a 6.5% increase for customers and water treatment plant design costs. Wastewater includes an 8% increase with a meadowlark pump station and UV light system. More information about rate increases and projects can be found in this story.
The city already took action due its intent to exceed the revenue neural rate. The public hearing for that item will be Sept. 8, as well.
The city also received its regularly scheduled quarterly budget update for this portion of 2025.
Budget analyst Michael Gentry said he mentioned sales tax was slightly lower than what the city was anticipating during the quarter one presentation. For this quarter, the city sales tax line item is doing slightly better, and when combined with city use tax and the county sales and use tax, it is still past where projected for the 2025 budget.
Parks and Rec revenues are coming in ahead of where they were last year, with consistent growth from year to year, which is what the city wants to see, Gentry said.
Franchise taxes are on par with what the city usually expects, he said. Court fines are still a high-performing revenue line item, but the city doesn’t want to assume that will always be a significant revenue generator, he said.
Gentry said overall the general fund revenue is having a strong performance and the same is true for expenditures. The funds have been consistent so far and are setting the city up well for 2026, he said.
The refuse fund revenue is coming in slightly lower than expected, but it isn’t something the city is currently worried about, he said.
During quarter one for electric, water and waste water, staff discussed that utility customer sales tax revenues were slightly below where they had expected even with rate adjustments, Gentry said. He said the same is true for quarter two but that they’re performing a little bit better than last quarter.
Sewer fund revenues are coming in slightly higher than expected compared to the other utility funds. Expenditures are also higher due to some emergency repairs this year.
The following graph shows the general fund revenues versus general fund expenses for the year:
The city also received a quarterly staff report from human resources specialist Susie Yuran. The city has a new management fellow, Kai Herrera. Yuran also recognized city staff who obtained first aid and CPR training certifications: Branden Boyd, Renee Davis, Kelly Delay, Phil Ellsworth, Michael Gentry, Tate Gordon, Jeremey Hatch, Jimmy Kegin, Mark Landry, Sally Pennington, Kiah Pogue, Jeremy Reimer, Michael Rubow, Kyle Sommer, Cody Wolf and Yuran.
Gordon Synder, Chad Musick and Mark Landry also obtained their Leadership Douglas County certifications.
Daniel said there are around 500 residential housing units coming to town, between subdivision, Paschal’s Landing and others. Daniel said he thought the addition of a new planner would be helpful to the projects coming down the pipeline.
Mayor Tim Reazin also thanked the police department for its targeted enforcement on K-10 with help from the state in paying for the program/overtime for officers.
Parks and Rec Director Sally Pennington said the pool will be open weekends only for the rest of its season. She said the pool will have had over 12,000 visitors for the season, which is an increase from the previous year. Pennington said 300 kids have enrolled in fall sports through the city.
Police Chief Wes Lovett said a 17-year-old took three cases of beer from Kwik Shop but, after drinking two of them, had since returned one case Monday afternoon.
Boyd said the outage Monday was caused by a squirrel near 14th and Fir but has since been fixed.
Reazin said he would like the opportunity for an open house type meeting about Nottingham Center development and to hear input from community members.
Following the regular business items, the commission went into executive session for about 20 minutes to discuss pending litigation. The agenda said the session was pursuant to the consultation with an attorney.
The commission had a special meeting at 6:30 p.m. for an executive session related to a monthly check-in with Daniel.
Reach Sara Maloney at [email protected]
