Hello, and welcome.

Hello, and welcome to our Tuesday Thursday evening uh budget workshop.

We're joined here by Director Royal Administrator Kane Rath.

Also in attendance is uh Deputy Administrator O'Malley.

Thank you all very much.

Uh Director Roy, please kick us off.

Hard copies can also be found at the city clerk's office and the library, the Lewiston Library.

Questions or budget suggestions should be emailed to Brian Kanerath at BK, AEN RATH at Lewiston Main.gov or public comment at Lewiston Main.gov.

Reminder, Monday, March 16th is the school budget, which will be held at 5 30 for you at the Green Ladle.

So we're going to start off with personal services and fringe benefits, which are on page 16 and 28 of your book.

The overall increase is a million six or 4.4.

You will see the table of the organization on page 16.

There is only one new position as city administrator mentioned on Tuesday, which is the health position.

There are 12 frozen full-time positions in this fiscal year 27 budget.

We re-froze the six from fiscal year 26, two police officers, three Class C highway workers, and one mechanic.

The additional for fiscal year 27 is one more police officer, two more Class C highway workers, one Class B highway worker, and one more mechanic, along with the city senior accountant.

Regular time and wages are on page 17 and 18, the overall increase of a million or 4.5%.

This includes all settled contracts and adjustments and state step increases.

The salary lines, you'll see credits within those salary lines.

So for the salary reserve, you'll notice on page I believe 18.

You'll see a credit in the current column.

So you'll see 230,400.

That is two quarters, so there'll be two more quarters coming in, so that will be a credit of 460,800.

The city currently has 20 active employees that have re-entered the in-service retirement drop program, which reduces most of the salaries between 5% and 15%, dependent on their labor union and their employing contract.

And remember there is one code officer that is budgeted in the CDBG line, which is 64,409.

You won't find that in the code budget.

That will be discussed on Tuesday at the CDBG budget.

Overtime on page 18, the overall increase is 110,000.

Although contracts settle in step increases, some have more impact.

Additional replaced hours and demand has produced increases of 82,700 in fire, 15,906 in police, and public works operation 22,754.

There's a decrease of 10,372 in general government.

This is all in elections.

Due to they had two elections in fiscal year 26, we'll only have the one in fiscal year 27.

Temporary wages is on page 19.

The overall increase of 91,784 or 21%.

The state of Maine minimum wage will increase January 1st, 2026 to $15.10 from the 1465.

Well, salaries are contractual, obligated temporary wages are not.

Just a reminder that departments that have temporary employees, if they no longer have those positions, the city would need permanent employees, which would also have an additional cost of benefits.

Due to one less election.

An increase in temporary highway wages of 32,640 for the assistance with vacation.

This gives the public works the ability to mentor temporary employees to potentially become full-time employees when vacancies arise.

This is for summer help.

An increase in central garage of $38,176 for hiring students enrolled in the automobile program.

This also gives the opportunity for the garage, the ability to mentor temporary workers to fill positions when they become available.

If you remember last year, we carry forward leftover funds from fiscal year 25 to 26 so that they could have that ability to get some temporary help in that department.

Increase in armory by 12,000, which is the transfer from the general fund to the rec account.

If you remember for the pool activities, the general fund puts in $62,000 to cover the wages and help out for the pool that's open in the summer.

An increase in library temporary wages of $12,172.

Other fees on page 19, overall 10,000 or 4%.

This is the mayor, council, and the board's stipends along with the attorney fees.

Fringe benefits on page 19 and 20.

The overall 549,978 or 4%.

Fringe benefits are considered contractual obligations due to union agreements.

As mentioned in one of the last year and in one of the notes earlier, the only way the city could adjust these are to eliminate positions.

Main PERS decreased by 212,985.

The police plan and the fire plan are at 13.2% for the employer contribution.

And the non-union and the office is 10.2%.

And then there's an additional 5% contribution for all employees that are retired and rehired in place.

So the amount for those main PERS were removed out of the budget.

Deferred COMP increased $8,795 for employees choosing deferred comp instead of main PERS.

FICA decreased $85,000, reflected for the 12 positions that were freezing.

Retirement Health Services savings.

This is a conversion of sick time.

In some of the group vacation times is converted to fund deposits for post-retirement health cost.

Contributions were estimated to increase $4,000.

This is due to the budget needs to be completed before the actual calculation.

So this is one of these numbers that might either go up slightly or go down at the end of March.

We will know we'll have the confirmed numbers.

State of Maine family medical leave.

If you remember last year, the governor signed into law July 11th, 2023 for the new program for paid family medical leave.

We did sign a contract with a private company, and those contributions will begin May 1st, 2026.

So we'll have a savings in fiscal year 26 budget because we had put in for the full year.

And since we went with a company and not the state of Maine, we'll have that savings for half a year.

City pension increased by 1,128.

There is one remaining pensioner.

This is an increase for COLA.

Health insurance buyout increased by the combined health insurance and the buyout of $372,000.

This is based on the current experience rate where we are budgeting 8.5% increase for half of the year, and we're using the fiscal year 26 for the other half, which was a 6% increase that we received.

Healthcare educator decreased by 1,258.

During fiscal year 24, this was reduced for the health care appointments.

This is now all done online.

Employees sign up and submit their information.

Some unions still have their screening and are covered, and the account also covers gym memberships.

Additionally, cross-charge to other funds offset to the additional gym membership.

Boston Mutual decreased 3,672.

The plan was closed to new enrollees in 1989, so the active employees pay for the benefit, then it becomes a paid up policy upon retirement.

Flexible spending decreased 4,688 due to less fees.

Health reimbursement arrangements decreased 10,800.

This reflects the anticipated usage of the fund.

The current offset offer is 1,200 for single, 2,400 for employee child or family coverage.

Workers' comp increased the largest at 488,288.

This includes 150 for the unfunded liability.

Currently at 2.9 million for our self-insured pool, which went down from prior year, that was at $3.4 million.

The total aggregate benefits that we paid out calendar year for 2025 was 1.5 million, which is an increase of 224,000 from the 24.

And this is due to the National Council on Compensation Insurance.

Their rates have increased.

So therefore we're going to see an increase in our cost.

Unemployment compensation remains flat.

Other, which is on page 20, increased 199,000 or 6.5%.

This line item reflects both the internal and external bill in for the municipal garage.

So you will see in the expense lines that all of the rentals from the municipal garage and other departments have gone up.

Some have gone up slightly, some have gone up more, depending on the vehicle that they rent.

So this is where the revenue comes into that.

So any questions on any of these items before we move to capital?

Councilor Nadine.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Thank you, Director Roy.

You had mentioned the drop program, and I just don't know what line item it is in here.

And if you could uh go over the drop program a little bit, I'd love to know more about it.

So this is the retire in place.

Let me find where that is.

So the cities currently have their 20 active employees that were working for us, and then they retire and come back into work for us.

And the retirement, they can only make so much for a wage.

So most of their wages, when you look at, like if you notice last year, Chief St.

Pierre looked really low compared to other individuals in their department.

That's because he was in that drop program, so his wage wasn't a full hundred percent, it was ninety or ninety-five, I can't remember exactly.

So that's you'll see in certain departments.

So 20 active employees have that, that they don't make their full hundred percent wage.

But they do in retirement benefits, it goes into the retirement.

Is that correct?

Can you get they get the retirement, the 5% retirement, but they don't get the full wage.

So if you were to look at steps on our tables and look and wonder why, say it was they were supposed to be making 140 and they're not, that's because they don't make the full, the percentage is decreased because of that retire.

Okay, so they're actively collecting retirement and they're being paid a lower amount while the government is.

And then the city is contributing.

They're still receiving funds into the retirement account as well.

Correct.

It's a certain percentage that goes in there.

Yeah, could you just point out the line item on that just so I'm aware of it?

Is it is it busted out there?

So that will be in every every wage that has one of those individuals.

So I can I can get you which department has those 20s.

Okay.

I know there's uh quite a few in the police department.

Okay.

Yeah, I would just appreciate just having an idea of like overall what that is.

And then uh the health insurance piece uh 4921 looks like uh our health insurance premiums went up considerably.

Is that correct?

So what we normally do with health insurance is we budget the half a year what our actual increase was because we receive our increases in January.

So from January to June to December, sorry.

January to not December, unlikely, isn't it?

January and June.

Yep.

We can budget at the 6%, but the remaining six months we estimate an 8.5 percent increase.

Just to be on the safe side, um, we did have a six percent for fiscal for 26.

We had seven percent for 25.

So to be on the safe side, we budget for 8.5 percent for that six months.

And when will we know what uh what the actual premiums are?

We won't know until we're closer to January.

January, okay.

Um and then the last question I had is around the uh workman's comp uh shortage.

And so we're currently 2.9 million dollars short of the funding library.

Uh fund amount.

Correct.

Correct.

And our insurance costs for workman's comp went up.

So no, the rates.

So then the national rates go up.

So what we do to calculate our amounts is they will take our wages.

So we have to do an audit every year with the state and an audit with the company that we source out that we actually give them our actual calendar year wages, and it takes that rate and times of by to make sure that we're at where we are.

Sometimes we end up getting another bill if um we estimated too low for for the amount of wages due to mostly it's usually overtime that comes in higher than what we've estimated.

Um that rate per a code.

So public works has a different code than us office individuals.

We have a lower code because we have a less of risk.

Um public works, fire, police, they have higher codes.

Those codes dropped for 2025, and that's why we saw a decrease in the budget for 25.

Um, I mean for fiscal year 26, but the codes have gone back up for the 26, so that's where we're gonna see the jump for our fiscal year 27.

So the it's not the amount of uh workmen's comp funding that people are actually yeah, exactly.

Claims that are actually being uh placed.

It's what we're being advised we need in order to cover our current employees.

Correct.

Should okay.

Um and if you could just speak really quickly, because I know the workers' comp fund has been underfunded for a very long time.

Could you tell me how long we've been running a deficit?

Do you have any?

I'd have to I'd have to go back and look at all of the reports, but I believe uh most towns run out of deficit because nobody funds their full, but I can go back and get you those amounts back years.

If we could just have an idea of of of what the dollar amount deficit is over a period of like let's say the past ten years, that would be helpful.

Because I know that in like 2024 we had assigned a larger amount to workmen's comp than was even suggested because we did have some some room there, um, but now seeing this increase.

I'm just wondering like what our trajectory is.

Do you know what I mean?

Like, right.

Our actually unfunded is going down from prior years.

So it is is um going down, it hasn't been going up.

As you notice, if you look at the amounts, I did put the amounts in there for you.

Um last year it was at 3.4 million, this year it's at 2.9.

So it is going down that we're getting closer to covering our full.

Yeah, I would just love to see like a on a decade-long trajectory, what percentage, I guess dollar amount and percentage of what we're supposed to have.

Thank you very much.

That's it for me.

Councilor Herman, did you have your hand up?

Thank you.

My question was answered.

Okay.

Uh further comments about uh personal services and fringe.

Counselor uh Chitam.

Yeah, I'd like to explore a little bit more about this workers' compensation.

This we're we're underfunded based on the recommendations of the underwriter or the people with whom we insure, but we're not underfunded in terms of our ability to meet what has been historically demands.

Correct.

And I think Councilman Edigini is asking for the number that illustrates that difference.

I will.

Yes.

We are never we have never been in the negative in the comp.

We we have paid what is need be.

Okay.

But I will get those along with the deficit that their reports have.

Is there a penalty uh for us not to be funded to the level that we're told we need to be funded?

Now these if you remember these reports do go to the bond rater rating companies.

So they look at everything on our um what we carry for for fund balance, what we carry for um unfunded liabilities.

So this is a report that they also get and review.

Okay.

Is there any way to quantify um the effect that this would have on our currently we're at a double A, I believe.

Double AA negative.

Double A negative, okay.

Um is there a way to quantify what financial or monetary penalty this underfunding would result in?

I could speak with the bond counselor.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Uh okay, I think we're up to capital LA.

So next is capital on page 29.

Just want to touch upon just a reminder of what it is.

We will go through these as you see in with the department.

So when the department is in front of you, this is when you will be able to ask them about their projects.

We're not going to go line by line tonight.

I just wanted to mention that with the sale of Main Street Fire, it looks like it's coming in higher than what we had originally credited for the fire station.

So I put in your breakout that that will be reduced about 25,000 more from what they're going to request.

So it'll be instead of the 7,041, it will be 7 million 16 that will be needed for the new Lisbon Street fire station.

So with that reduction, the limited cap is at 27 million over.

So that's it for capital.

As I mentioned, we will be discussing projects, the projects as the departments come up, so that you can ask them questions on their LCIP capital that they requested.

Unless you have any other questions, we'll move on to general government.

Uh Councillor Nijene, did you have something?

Um just out of the um the TIFF request this year.

I know that some of these have been funded partially over a period of years, like for instance the Bridge Street Bridge.

Uh, I believe we had uh assigned a hundred thousand dollars in the last year's budget uh to it.

Um if we could see uh like just a breakdown of like how much has been requested and funded over a period of time for certain programs, that would be very helpful.

Just so we have an idea like overall in our minds, like you know, Sunnyside Park, we'd given some money for last year, and it's it again here for another amount.

And so gives me an idea of how much we're asking for overall as well as like what what the progress is.

So thanks.

So we're gonna move to general government.

So we'll start with the uh legislature and executive is page 30 to 31.

Your overall increase is 81,696.

City council remains flat.

The mayor increase 4,700.

This is due to uh the digitizing of the mayor portrait and the mayor's coalition, which is a new does.

City administrative on page 30, overall increase of 70,609.

This is for that new position for public health.

And then marketing increase 6,387.

It's all in wages.

If you would like to step up, Angie.

If Angie's here to if you would like to ask her any questions on the marketing department.

Counselor Nagene, yes.

So overall all of the increases are coming in wages.

And I guess the question is are you putting another person on the team or or what's happening?

That's just no.

Okay.

So that's just okay, gotcha.

Okay.

So next is city attorney on page 37.

You'll see an overall decrease of 7,500.

That is taking the estimate of the average over the monthly bills and seeing a decrease in that of 12,000 with an increase of 4500 for legal services other than legal, kind of like the investigations or anything that's done on the side that's not from the lawyers.

That line has been added.

Do we uh I is that everything for cities?

Yes, that's everything for city attorney.

Do you have a question about city attorney uh counselor Herman?

Yes, I'm just wondering where to find that in our book.

Uh page 37 covers assessing 32, actually.

32.

Oh, sorry, 32.

My mistake.

All right.

Thank you.

Okay.

Next is City Clerk on page 33.

Counselor Chinamus, did you have something?

Thank you.

Yes.

Miscellaneous services shows up a lot.

Are we going to get detail on what that is and why is the attorney going up from 500 to 5,000?

What are miscellaneous services for the city attorney?

So that's the new service that I mentioned.

The 4,500 that's put in there, that's not for attorney fees, that's for other legal fees, such as an investigator.

So currently we have no line item for that when it comes up and we need to do an investigation.

So that line has been added in there.

So overall, the whole department is a decrease of 7,500.

All right.

So that line then comes out of the other fees.

The uh 415,000.

So yes.

So that is the legal fees for the lawyer.

Yeah.

Okay.

And that's just for our accounting purposes, so we'll get a handle on what non-legal fees are.

Correct.

But billed to Brandon Isaacson or Brandon Isaac's.

Brandon Isaacson are all the other fees.

The miscellaneous services are for individuals who are hired that are not the lawyer that are doing investigations.

And I'm maybe helpful.

So for example, this past year, as you know, there were about a number of uh investigations we paid for uh for various things.

Maybe it would be helpful if we could get the information how much we spent this year on investigations to show that that's you know probably smart to build into the budget in future years when these things do arise.

And do those do those investigations bill us directly or do that do are we billed through Brandon Isaacson?

No, we're billed directly.

Okay.

All right.

Thank you.

Next is city clerk in election on page 33.

Their overall decrease is 25,000 or 4.8 percent.

City clerks on page 33 had an overall increase of 7,088.

The largest increase is their wages.

Election had a decrease of 32,000 or 26.7.

Their largest decrease is in salaries and temporary wages due to, as I mentioned earlier, one election instead of two.

City clerk is here to answer any questions you may have on her department.

Any questions for the city?

Counselor Chinam, yes.

Yeah, I noticed that uh telephone has gone up as as have others several other items uh across the board.

Uh why is that?

So in prior years, the city clerk did not get a cell phone stipend where she should.

Um so that was put in for the budget.

Is that going to be the same answer for all the other telephone increases?

Are we now giving cell phones to other employees or no?

She is the only one.

The other lines you see that are increasing in telephone are most likely for tablets for the internet coverage for tablets.

Okay.

Thank you.

Again, miscellaneous services.

Sure.

So miscellaneous services, we have the two.

Can you uh speak into the mic, please?

Thank you.

We have the operations account and the elections account.

Miscellaneous services for the operation side is simply uh for unexpected uh I apologize, Madam Clerk.

You probably still need to move the mic closer to you.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Is that better?

Yeah, possibly, yes, thank you.

For operations, um, miscellaneous services is if we need to replace any small equipment um like a printer or um something like that, or if we need to purchase any unexpected supplies that are not anticipated, not budgeted for, that's on the operation side.

On the election side, miscellaneous covers the programming of our voting machines.

I don't know why it's um necessarily considered under miscellaneous and not its own um account, but um that's where it's always been budgeted for.

So that's the programming of the voting machines.

If it's a state election, the state will pay for the programming of the machines, but if it's a city election, we um need to cover that.

And the increase of uh $3,530 over uh last year's proposed and revised budgets.

Uh why is that such a great increase?

Sure.

It is for um the programming of the machines for a city election.

And so it's the programming of the voting machines that people will use at the polls for the city ballots, and then it's the programming of the accessible voting machines, the touch screen that are for uh voters who need um assistance.

The ADA machine is for programming that for city ballots, as well as creating an accessible absentee ballot, which is an electronic absentee ballot for folks who have uh vision impairment.

Was that uh expense in another line in prior years?

No, it's always been in this line.

Well, again, we we spent $200 or we budgeted $200 last year, and we're looking at $3,700 this year.

We can take a look at that and see if it was in another account, but it should always be in the miscellaneous account.

Okay, I do see that we actually spent $3,600 this year, but I I'm wondering why we under budgeted so much.

We we know when the elections are going to be and what we have.

Right, and we're gonna have a city one every November now.

So if you could get an answer, that'd be appreciated.

Thank you.

Counselor Najine.

Uh thank you very much, Mr.

Mayor.

Um just a couple of quick questions, City Clerk.

Um, I'm showing um that we have that advertising and marketing line, which looks like we've appropriated 2,500.

Spent 600 so far, we're appropriating 2800, or asking to budget for 2800 for 2027.

What is that fund for specifically?

Sure.

So uh it is for legal ads for your uh land use code and city code of ordinances amendments, but the biggest cost is the LCIP bond ad, and that's almost a quarter page ad, and that always runs every May.

So the budget is going to look like it's full and healthy right now, but it will by the end of the fiscal year we'll be using that because that's the very end of the year expense that we have every year.

Okay.

And the second piece was uh the code ordinances.

So what is that?

Uh so that's uh 4141 uh 42600.

Uh looks like we've appropriated 1,800, spent none and we're appropriating $1,800 for next year.

What's it for?

Uh same situation.

It's an end of the fiscal year expense, it's an annual expense.

It's we purchase for whatever reason in my budget the fire, the national fire prevention set of fire codes, life safety fire codes have always been budgeted in my account.

It's an electronic um version that they receive, they need to get it every year as updates come out.

So it's an $1,800 bill, and I just signed it last week.

So it again it hasn't hit the fiscal year accounting yet.

And that's related to uh permitting, I assume?

Uh right.

And and any of the inspections that the fire department does, it's the National Fire Prevention Code.

Okay, thank you.

Back to you, Councillor Trudan.

Uh thank you, Madam Clerk.

It would seem to me that would be a fire expense.

I'm wondering, could that be moved into the fire department?

Uh we can certainly talk about it when I started here 30 years ago.

It was in this budget, so it's just maintained in this budget um ever since.

Probably because it's codes.

Probably, right?

Is that available to anyone other than the fire department?

Can the public access that?

Not the public because you need certain uh passcodes to access it, but I'm sure code and code enforcement, the code enforcement department could if they needed to.

Okay, thank you.

I know I know these codes are expensive.

Is it just the NFPA?

Uh, that's it.

Okay, what about BOCA?

They have the same situation.

They would budget it in their own department.

In co-forcement.

Next is finance on page 34 and 35.

There's an overall decrease of $57,000 or 5.5 percent.

The finance and administration on page 34, overall increase of 3,654, which is in wages.

Purchasing on page 34, overall increase of 6,647, mostly in wages.

This is due to um, as mentioned every year.

Lead gives funds whenever there's a bid done, the purchasing agent and the assistance time.

Whenever there is a what ton?

A bid.

Oh, a bid, thank you.

Um the deputy director purchasing and the administration assistant portion of their wage for that hour or however long that process is credited from that.

That has lessened because there's less bids going out.

So that's why you see an increase of 7,000 in that wage.

Accountant and auditing overall decrease of $82,000.

This is for that frozen position, uh, the senior accountant.

Tax and treasury on page 35, you see an overall increase of $14,338.

The largest increase you'll see in postage due to the certified mailing cost is going up.

In 2025, it went up to 10 $10.44 cents from $964.

So we're going to see an increase when we send out certified mail.

The estimated to go up another 6 percent.

So we're estimating in fiscal year 27 to see 1106 for a cost for each piece of mail that goes out that's certified.

And central services is an overall decrease of 250 dollars.

This is where our central large printer is that we use, like when I'm printing for the budget or any of those items.

So there's paper there that gets charged off to departments.

We're seeing an overall decrease in printing.

So that's why this line is decreasing.

That is division of finance.

Any questions on finance?

Counselor Chitham, you've been recognized.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

The uh accountant position, which is now frozen.

Um how long has that position been empty?

Um it's been emptied.

The individual has moved over to the tax and treasury side and took the cash management position.

So it has been vacant probably about a month.

Okay, and it will be frozen.

It will be frozen for the full year.

And what impact is this going to have on the ability of the finance department?

So I have shifted around responsibilities.

So things will be shifted around in the position the bank reconciliation.

The items that this person did will be shifted to different individuals.

I'm taking over the supervising piece of the deputy, therefore he can take on more of the other responsibilities along with we're shifting some of the responsibilities for to the senior um utility accountant.

So we're shifting everything around so that nothing will be forgotten.

Okay, that leads to the question which applies in all of these frozen positions.

What's the difference between freezing a position and eliminating a position?

So, in the hopes that next year revenues will be higher and the position can come back.

Um, if we eliminate it, then it's usually harder to get back if the the funds come back when we do budget for fiscal year 28.

It keeps it on the books.

Right.

Essentially.

If we want to increase, let's say we have a banner year and a revenues come in way over projections and we want to add staff, what's the process for doing that if they're not frozen positions?

If we want to create new positions, is that a complex process?

Does that come before the council?

How does that work?

You're talking about mid-fiscal year?

Uh or even budgeted if we wanted to.

For example, this year we're going to be talking about adding uh a public health officer.

Um the council has requested that this be included in a budget.

That seemed like a fairly simple process.

Can we have this position?

If administration had requested a position, would it come for uh budgeting, obviously budgeting purposes to the council?

Is there any other council approval that's needed to add a position?

Uh it would be the budget, correct?

It would be the budget.

Um if you decided, say, as we spoke last year about the police officers when we froze the police offices.

If you remember, there was that discussion that if we end up doing good with revenues and we needed to hire another police officer, it would come in front of the council to approve to use those excess funds, or either look at the salary reserve and able to hire that position if it's not during the budget season.

Okay, so what I'm hearing is that eliminating the position and freezing the position both to fill eliminated positions or create to fill frozen positions or create new positions, both require council approval on the budget.

And that's that's it.

So I guess I'm not understanding how it's easier and it's a matter of semantics, but we're carrying frozen 11 frozen or 12 frozen, I heard the number earlier, 12 uh positions.

If we have revenues and to fill those positions mid-year, are they automatically filled or does it come back to the council?

No, it comes back.

Okay, appropriation.

Then what's the advantage of saying we have 11 or 12 frozen positions?

I think again it's it's it's leaving them on the books versus eliminating.

So if if we if we're in this position next year and the budget is looking a lot better than this year, uh we have the ability to unfreeze or fill those positions again.

If they're eliminated, now we're creating a new position again into the budget.

So uh I think some of it is just you know semantics as you say, but in effect we're leaving them on the books uh with the hope that in a future better uh climate uh we're able to just fill those.

They have been identified as as needed positions throughout the organization for sure.

Um I don't think we we necessarily want to see these positions eliminated for the long term forever, but for this year, with the circumstances that we're in, uh it makes sense to freeze positions that are currently open rather than looking to layoffs, certainly.

Okay.

Thank you.

So next would be MIS on page 36.

There's an overall increase of 13,652 or 1.5.

The increase is in maintenance and licenses for the MUNIS, which is our financial software, and Microsoft 365.

The directors here if you have any questions on the MIS budget.

Councillor June, do you have a question?

Uh well, yes, I'm looking at a reduction in the salaries and wages line.

Uh that's unusual.

That is oh sorry, go ahead.

Go ahead.

I was just gonna say we had an employee that had many, many years retire, and we replaced them with a new employee, so the salary is much lower.

Excellent.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

So next is assessing on page 37.

The overall increase is 51,749 or 14 percent.

Increase in uh wages due to the two assistants getting their certification and an increase of 22,990 in contracted services.

That's mostly in the miscellaneous services for the revaluation of the personal property.

Last year this was paid with fund balance.

This year we have no fund balance, so it's been put in the budget.

That's why there is a large increase.

So the director is here if you have any questions for him on assessing.

Counselor Chitum.

Last year you say it was paid by the fund balance.

Correct.

If an item is paid by fund balance, it doesn't show up in the budget.

Last year it showed up in the budget and then we removed it for fund balance and went over this when we explained.

So it brings that budget to a zero for the original budget.

If you look in the line that says revise budget, you'll see the 20,000 in there.

That's the fund balance that we put in to that account to cover that.

So it's not in the original budget because it's covered by fund balance, but it's in the revised because it was an encumbrance to cover from the fund balance.

I guess uh I view perhaps naively the fund balance as a savings account.

And I don't understand why it makes a difference whether we're paying for a position from taxpayer revenue or uh revenue sharing from the state or a grant uh or the fund balance.

It's a position that's in the budget and it costs the city money.

Why, if it's coming from our savings account, doesn't it show up in the budget?

Or am I missing the point completely?

So it's it's fund balance doesn't show up on the in the budget for the original budget.

Your original budget is what is gonna be taking your revenues that you've received, reducing that expense, and then giving you your tax rate.

So the amount of money that you need to raise for taxation.

If fund balance was in there, then you'd have to have a line for fund balance to offset it.

I see.

Thank you.

That explains it.

I mean fund fund balance uh uh directory fund balance uh you know functions much as uh retained earnings does in the in the corporate world, is that correct?

Correct.

Councillor Najing, did you have anything?

Um just real quick, thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um uh Sessor Haley, are you are you comfortable with the concept that we don't have any overtime budgeted for this particular year when we're gonna be going through uh the reaval?

It's gonna be difficult.

Uh originally in uh the first phase of my budget, I did request a position.

Understanding uh the circumstances we're in and I I completely get it.

Uh it will be challenging.

There's no question.

Um I will have to press the staff and they're very, very good uh to work as hard as they can and try to get everything done in the regular course of a business day.

Okay.

Understood.

And do we have uh contingency?

Well, we obviously do.

When we said that we only have that we don't have any fund balance, we actually have 10 percent of our operating budget in fund balance, correct?

So if we would there was a needed correct.

Okay.

So there are also a lot of employees who comp their time instead of taking the overtime so that they can use it a lot at a later time.

So that's why you see a lot of departments don't have any overtime budget because most of those individuals like to comp their time and use it for time off.

Okay, understood.

Counselor Herman.

Thank you.

Um so it says under dues that there's there's an increase of 7,338 due to the dues going from 40 dollars to sixty-five dollars.

Um it looks like that's a hundred dollars in the budget.

So where's the 7,338 uh show up in here?

What's the uh so there were other items within that account?

That was the largest increase.

So there's the main association for assessing officers.

There is the main chapter of the international.

All those dues went up slightly.

It was just that was the largest one.

I didn't list every single one, and I can if that's what you guys would prefer.

Um, but I try to list the largest increase in which dues, so that you're not seeing every single thing in the breakout.

So there were other dues that increased to make up for that difference.

So I I guess where on page 37 are is the other 7,238.

It may be um I don't think it was 7,000.

I might have added accidentally added.

So dues increased.

I think I accidentally added um's increased 100.

So that was my error.

Okay.

That shouldn't say 7,338.

Should say 100.

All right, thank you.

Any further questions for assessing?

I think we're good.

Nexus human resources.

Thank you for your uh department's effort.

On page 38, the overall increase is 96,473 or 33 percent.

The increase is mostly in wages for 83,085.

This is due to the if you remember the DEI position that was in city administration that was covered by a grant last year or this year, um, is now a workforce development specialist and moved to the human resources department.

That's the largest increase.

Do you have any questions for the human resources directly?

That grant is now expired.

That's the cost, obviously.

Questions for Director Tario.

Councilor Chutham.

Uh, can you explain the credit?

Somebody explain the credit for uh school safety coordinator.

Correct.

So the school, because we have the safety coordinator at the city, the school pays a portion of his salaries due to the due to him going into the schools for safety issues.

Okay, and can you explain the role of the safety coordinator?

I guess this is for Director Terrier.

Yep.

So um our safety coordinator goes to the case.

Just uh move the mic closer to you for our folks at home.

So you're asking as far as like going into the schools or in general.

No, what's his job or her job?

Yep.

So he does all of our work evaluations, he handles um all of the workers, comp claims he goes and investigates the incidents, um, figures out how to prevent them in the future.

He does a lot of training on prevention and safety.

He monitors uh the different work sites to make sure that everybody is working working safely as well.

So this is Lewiston's own OSHA officer.

Pretty much.

Okay.

Thank you.

Counselor Nadine.

Um just to check real quick here.

Did so we froze 12 positions.

We have one new position in the budget.

But this workforce development coordinator is a new position, is it not?

It's not.

So it was originally in the administration budget, and then we moved it over to human resources to be able to utilize it to its fullest potential.

Was it filled last year?

It was, yep.

Okay.

So this this has not been a vacant position at any point?

No.

Nope.

Okay.

So basically, uh, I guess a little over a year ago, about a year ago, the name of the position was changed.

Um, and then the grant is expiring uh this year.

So this is essentially, you know, I guess technically it is adding a position where we're covering funding for a position.

I mean the grant is now expired, but the name was changed, I guess what was it about a year ago, Ryan?

Yes.

Um, you recall the last year's budget was the workforce development specialist, and that was covered.

Um we did change the job description um and we did move it over to HR based on the responsibilities of the workforce development specialist.

I mean, and and I I know at the um probably the she had submitted um a position, which I denied um on our budget, but we have one person, our HR director for almost 400 employees, and then she has an assistant, um, a general specialist.

So comparing our size of our um workforce to other agencies, having one person doing all of you know dealing with HR to me did not seem a good use for our folks or good um so that's when we created that workforce amount.

You and it was but last year it was covered.

Um and that's what we're seeing now.

But really, what we did would we just slid it from one department.

So instead of reporting to me, workforce development reports to HR director.

Okay.

Perfect.

And and ultimately, so we currently have three positions total in HR, is that correct?

It's four of you include the safety coordinator.

Four if we can okay.

Okay.

Counselor Chitam, the grant that funded the DEI position renamed to workforce development specialist, uh, where was that grant from and is it available anymore?

That was from the Sewell Foundation, and no, it is not.

I will say the workforce development specialist is applying to for another grant um from Sewell.

Um and I mentioned this a couple of meetings ago.

Um she's applying for a 50,000 grant to help try to offset the cost for that public um health position.

Um I don't know if she's gonna get it.

I mean, there's a lot of competition for that money, um, and we won't find out till maybe uh May, uh I believe the end of April, early of May, if that position would be uh if we obtain that $50,000.

And that'll presumably be after the budget's approved.

That is correct.

I mean, if we don't have that position, I know that that's a new position with a tight budget.

I'm not sure how that will um reflect in terms of our ask for the $50,000.

But if we were got it, could we get somebody to work part-time at $50,000?

I don't know.

But if the council now rejects the public health officer and says we can't afford that this year, does that mean that the application of the Sewell Foundation for the grant to cover a portion of that could not be used for the workforce development specialists?

If I can continue to answer there, Mr.

Kanerath, um, what we could do is bring it forward to you as we often do when we apply for grants and you would uh accept and appropriate it, and we could say, okay, if we can fill this position for $50,000, we would do that.

But that would come in front of you, whether or not we cut this position or not, if we awarded that grant, we will come to you and and we do this for many things, burn grant, all types of things that you would accept and appropriate it.

Thank you.

Counselor Nadine.

And just on that same note, um, thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um, just on that same note, we also have the ability to, for instance, if you if we're freezing police officer positions, we can still decide to appropriate funds for them if we're advertising for them, right?

Like we don't have to necessarily um say we're not gonna advertise for these positions if we can find a candidate to fill them, and then we just ask for that position to be appropriated at a later date.

Is that basically correct?

So we could unfreeze if the council decides when we're going through budget, decides they do not want to freeze the position or all 12 positions that is the council's decision to make.

Well, I'm talking specifically to police officer uh positions, and what what I'm saying is even if we freeze the positions, we can continue to advertise for them and then uh ask for appropriation for that position at a later date.

Is that correct?

We don't we don't advertise for any of the frozen positions.

So I will say um we currently have police officer positions still open, so it is posted.

So it is posted.

We're just freezing some of them.

But we could decide to unfreeze a position.

Also, correct?

If we wanted to, Middle.

We could decide to unfreeze something.

If the council.

So for the budget purposes.

Again, for the budget purposes, we we would freeze a position, but then at a later date, if we find that we have the opportunity to hire an employee for the police department in particular, we can unfreeze that position and appropriate the funds.

So if you know this fall, you know, we had a flood of candidates.

We could, but then we could unfreeze the position, fund it, and make some hires.

Okay.

Perfect.

Thank you.

Yeah.

And when we're talking about the police department, we haven't frozen all the positions.

Correct.

There's still going to be some open.

And then I also understand there's going to be coming retirements that we also need to repress.

So we have positions to work with for sure.

Uh this year still.

Yep.

Uh and just for the public's uh benefit, we can only send so many people to uh uh police academy at one time.

So we're bounded by constraints here.

Uh Counselor Chitum did uh I'm sorry, Counselor Nijin, did you have anything else?

No, not at all.

Thank you.

Yes.

Uh Counselor Chinum, did you have a final thought here?

Uh question, yes.

It's it's the same funding, but what is describe labor relations, the $10,000 uh line item there, Director Terrio.

Which line item are you referring to?

Uh 428300 labor relations.

That line item is for mediation and arbitration and salary surveys.

So as we have open contract negotiations, those are the funds that we draw down from if we need to go to arbitration or if we um have a situation within the union that we have to go to mediation, we would use those funds to draw down.

Thank you.

So that concludes our um budget meeting for tonight.

I want to remind everybody that the school budget is March 16th at the Green Ladle at 530.

And then our next one will be uh workshop before the March 17th.

We'll be going over economic development, TIFF, and CDBG.

Counselor Herman, did you have something?

Yes.

Thank you.

Just going back to Tuesday.

Are we covering revenue tonight?

It was I'm sorry, it was next Thursday night that we're covering it.

Okay.

Sorry about that.

Stay tuned.

Uh Council Roy, yes.

Um, thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um I just want to uh tell people out there in TV land if that's the way to do it.

Um please email us.

If there are any concerns about the budget, anything you want us to be aware of to look at, to think about, please, please, please email us and let your um your thoughts be heard.

I would appreciate that.

Uh administrator Kenrath, uh I'm trying to find it here, but we have a um budget uh budget hearing on this next meeting or no?

No, the public hearing, the first public hearing.

April 7th.

Is April 7th?

April 7th.

Okay, I see it now.

Okay.

Uh yes, Councilor Nagy.

Um thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um quickly, I understand that there may be some retirements before the end of this fiscal year for certain departments.

Um has there ever been a situation where we've either frozen those positions for the for the following budget or considered uh a realigning of those positions in order to possibly streamline some of the uh um I'll I'll use an example.

I think the police supervisory union has 16 members right now uh out of a total of 87 staff.

Uh and was there any consideration for possibly eliminating one of those positions?

We have not any positions that have become vacant after this process that we did the budget, we have not frozen.

So they're just expected to be filled for the next either either from the ranks below normally, correct?

People get promoted up.

Uh okay.

Thank you.

Uh Counselor Chitum, yes.

Uh thank you.

In general, um this is a very tight budget, and I'm sure you've gone over it with a fine-tooth comb, but I see every department has dues and miscellaneous services.

Have those been looked at minutely?

Are all the dues absolutely necessary to perform the functions?

And are miscellaneous services um ill-defined, but are they absolutely necessary in the amounts listed for every department?

You want to just say something about dues.

Uh so dues most of them are involving uh memberships in professional organizations, which relates to training.

Um I will say in general, I think uh, you know, having worked in other organizations, we need uh more training opportunities available here, not less.

I think we're already sort of a bit short in a lot of areas in how much we do with staff development and training.

So um I'd be hesitant to start pulling.

I understand we're in a tough year, um, but we also have to continue to invest in our people.

And so I'd be hesitant to um in a drastic way start cutting in dues and not allowing people to be uh part of professional organizations and other things.

Um certainly something we could look at, um, but I think it certainly has an impact on uh uh the quality of staff, the training of staff, and the morale of staff uh for sure.

So just uh a general statement on that, Patrice.

Along with certifications.

So some of those um dues are for membership that they need for their certification to keep certified.

So just a thought on that.

Okay, thank you.

Um and one final off the wall blue sky out of nowhere question.

Um payroll represents a significant portion of the city budget.

Uh much of that payroll is dictated by contracts.

A contract between the city and an employee does not preclude that employee from saying, in the interest of public service, I will forego my increase this year.

Has there been any exploration of asking employees if they are willing to forego their raise or a portion of it in recognition for some non uh in in exchange for some non-monetary recognition?

Not this time.

Is that something that's worth exploring?

My guess is probably no.

Uh heading back to um professional um uh dues, uh yeah, the dues line item.

So, you know, sometimes cutting dues can be counterproductive because uh you know many uh licensed professionals need to keep up on their CE and these zoos in these professional uh associations provide an opportunity for low cost CE uh that we would uh then be on the cook for higher on the hook for higher cost CE if they were not in these organizations.

Counselor Najine.

Um Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Uh Director Roy, one thing I just wanted to note really quickly.

Um the reorganization within your department in order to absorb uh the work uh flow for the for the one employee that has shifted departments is greatly appreciated.

Um I think that that any place where we can do that in different departments, and obviously it's gonna be the director's decisions in order to decide whether to do that or not.

But what you've done um is uh very accommodating to for a very tight budget, and it's greatly appreciated by the council, uh at least by myself.

Thank you.

Counselor Herman, did you have something?

Uh I was just gonna say um while it's I guess a noble idea to ask employees to maybe forgo uh an increase.

I would think if they're covered under a CBA that that would either be a violation of it or be very close to doing that.

Um to have your employer come to you and ask you to not to forego something that is guaranteed in your contract.

So I would just I don't know.

I just wouldn't think it would be seen as good faith.

Counselor uh Martell, did you have something?

Yeah, just to that, I I can't imagine, excuse me, where anybody would be excited about not getting their raise or anything else, but I think it's important that we recognize that uh there's gonna have to be cuts or you know, we've heard from the public, or at least I have, these tax increases are not being received well, and something is gonna happen.

Positions are gonna be cut, services are gonna be cut, something is going to have to happen, or we're gonna have pitchforks outside of City Hall when these new tax bills come in, and I I I don't imagine that anybody would welcome losing their their raise, but if the alternative is cutting positions or departments or services, um we have a lot of tough dis decisions in front of us.

And um I just think we have to look at the lesser of two evils in some circumstances.

That's all.

Uh thank you, Counselor Martel.

Uh I would also, you know, these are obviously great discussions to have, and you know, we've kind of seen where the budget is headed.

Uh before we start committing to things I would like to get a certain way through the budget, you know, understand everything, all of the expenses, and then kind of go from there.

Administrator Kenrath, yes.

Yeah, thank you.

Just on uh to follow up on tough decisions, as Councilor Martel mentioned.

Um we've already made four point one million dollars worth of them so far.

I think we're understanding that probably more need to happen.

Um we're gonna be discussing a meeting further to uh really devise uh a I'll call it a menu of options for the council to look at for additional cuts and additional areas of savings.

Um none of these are going to be fun or pleasant, um, but I feel like it's also uh incumbent upon us to do that.

So we are going to be developing uh I'll call it a menu of options uh to get to some lower numbers.

Um again, they'll be pretty difficult, but but I think we we have to do this.

So we're gonna be preparing some things.

Um we'll be sharing uh that with you as we go through this process.

So um just know we're already looking at um where else we could potentially go, what scenarios we could potentially look at, and so we're gonna be pr preparing some options for you uh to look at in addition to obviously entertaining the ideas that you have to achieve further cost savings.

Thank you, Administrator Kenrath.

Counselor Nagine, did you have something?

Um it can wait.

Okay.

Uh and with that, uh Counselor Nagine, yes.

I sorry, just to circle back around.

So d I don't know if the this is the appropriate moment to bring this up, but um the public health officer position.

I I spoke with the public health committee today, and I I made it pretty clear that like there probably wasn't any funding source for this position.

Um I think in a very tight budget year when we're looking at a four point seven uh sorry, seven point one percent increase on the city side and with the tax reavals, the average homeowner looking at a fifteen hundred to two thousand dollar increase and their taxes, regardless of what we do with the city budget, is probably uh an appropriate time to suggest removing that position from the budget overall.

Um I don't know where everybody else is.

I would agree with you.

My recommendation would be to uh wait on that uh at least until next year and let us try to identify some grant funding.

But I think um this budget, I think it's uh I think it's important to to be able to say like no new positions were added in this budget, especially if we are potentially entertaining uh layoffs and we're already entertaining twelve frozen positions and we're now creating a new position.

Um I don't think that's the right message in general.

So it was put in the budget, obviously, because we discussed it.

There was a request to have it in, we honored that request.

Um but my recommendation uh would be to to pull it out for this year.

Maybe we can entertain it next year, uh and we can also potentially look at some areas for for grant funding as has been previously discussed.

Uh yes, Councilor Chitam.

Thank you.

Back to semantics.

Can we leave it in the budget and freeze it?

I guess we could, yes.

Um if that's the mechanism, then I would just as soon do that.

Uh create the position and freeze it immediately.

Uh it sounds silly, but uh I know there's a there's a large drive to have a public health officer here.

I think it's necessary.

And the only reason that we're not entertaining it, uh at least I don't think we're entertaining it this year, is because of budgetary constraints.

So that to me is a prime candidate for this process of freezing a position.

Final thoughts before we wrap up uh this evening, counselors.

Uh yes, back to you, counselor and aging.

I I would just reiterate again that any departments that are looking at uh um retirements um or departments that uh experience um uh a vacancies uh towards uh the during this budget uh process, perhaps we don't fill those positions or per perhaps we figure out ways to reorganize uh those responsibilities in order to start to if we're losing an employee through a natural process, right?

That employee has decided to either retire or that put employees decided to go work for another organization.

Um an ability from the director's perspective, and it's gonna be different for each department for sure to to decide whether or not that workload can be carried by the remaining staff for what however long, right?

For one budget season uh basically.

Um and ultimately I think we're not gonna get out from under this without creating revenues.

And so revenues come from many different ways, but taxes are the big one.

Um so uh we need to be able to create more taxable properties within the city.

So thank you.

Uh all right, uh thank you both.

Uh Minister Malley, Deputy Administrator O'Malley, thank you.

Uh thank you, Council.

Thank you to everyone watching.

You all have a wonderful evening, and we're gonna see you back on Monday.

Green whittle.

Uh the green label.

Yes.

Thank you.