The Finance & Personnel Committee met on August 10, 2026, to consider a lengthy agenda including the 2027-2031 Capital Improvement Budget (CIP), multiple special assessment resolutions, ARPA fund reallocation, a police camera donation, TID amendments, and closed session matters. The most contentious item was the CIP, which failed after amendments and debate. Several other items were approved unanimously or with one dissenting vote.
So as I was explaining, the increase of debt service, if it's a million dollars from a year, doesn't necessarily equate to a million dollar increase to the operating budget, which is due to multiple factors. I mean, there's other funds that come into the debt service fund, such as investment earnings on the funds that are in the debt service fund. When we issue debt, sometimes uh we sell it at a premium. So we sell it for more than it's worth, so we get more funds than we're expecting, and those funds need to be used to pay down the debt as well. Uh, there's also other funds such as room tax and other funds that support the debt service. So just a note on that. And then in the bottom right of the slide was some assumptions that were made. Um we were authorized for 15.9 million for the 2026 borrowing, and we're projected to use $2 million of unappropriate funds. So that's where the borrowing of 13.965%. And then the borrowing targets for 27 through 2031 are listed as well as the assumed interest rate. Um the next slide is going over debt limits. Just want to kind of revisit um what kind of constraints or debt limits we have as a municipality when we go out to issue new debt. So the state law limits the amount of outstanding general obligation debt to 5% of a municipality's equalized value. So as of December 31st, 25, that would put our debt limit at 298 million. Now we have a city ordinance that sets a stricter debt limit at 75% of the debt of the state limit. So that would put us at uh a limit of 223.8 million. And currently, as of the end of 25, we had total applicable debt of 125 million, which means per our policy we have a borrowing capacity of 98 million that we could borrow up to to stay within our limit. Uh so those limits are kind of on the total outstanding debt that we can have. Uh, there's also on the tax levy side, there's limits. Uh Wisconsin law allows municipalities the authority to increase the tax levy up to the full amount of the annual debt service expenditures that year. Um and then I just have a few more points to finish up this uh presentation. Um tonight uh with the approval and the ultimate approval at council, uh they'll be authorizing the capital fund appropriation for just year one, year twos through five are more plans, and that's not authorizing those amounts. Um the 2027 borrowing um will tip it typically uh schedule is it gets issued in the third quarter, so it'll get issued in the third quarter of 2027 with the first payment due to hit the 2028 operating budget. And when the uh borrowing targets were set um in projections, it was projected that the 2027 borrowing amount that we have before you would increase the 2028 debt service expenses by 250,000 on the operating budget levy. Are there any questions for Deputy DeGure? Seeing none, thank you very much. Appreciate it. Would anyone like to make a motion to recommend to adopt? I motion to adopt. Excuse me, Councilmember Newberry. Can I motion to adopt? Yes. Okay. Do you want 20? Motion to recommend to adopt by council member Newberry, seconded by council member Northwood. Are there any questions? Councilmember Seleznikal. Thank you, Chair. There is a proposed amendment. I'm wondering if that needs to be considered prior to actually adopting the budget. And I guess my my question is I did have a question about the proposed amendment. So if that's appropriate, I would like to ask staff for a I guess clarification. Is there anyone like here to speak to that amendment? Good evening. Yes, I have amendment for the capital equipment. Of course, we submit these in February. Snowplow season's not over. And then of course we go through the trucks and we start evaluating. After the last snow season, uh we've made it or last past snow plowing season, uh, kind of made an adjustment and would like to go with one tandem and three singles instead uh because we do have a little more need. And I mean, again, trucks that you know for this budget we won't see until 2028.