Ocean City Mayor and City Council Budget Meeting - April 7, 2026
Ocean City Mayor and City Council Budget Meeting - April 7, 2026
The meeting was called to order at 1:00 PM on April 7, 2026. The Mayor added an emergency agenda item regarding a council resignation effective April 6, 2026, creating a second vacancy. A discussion and vote on rescheduling the special election preceded the scheduled budget presentations. The budget presentations covered the proposed FY27 operating budget, internal service funds, enterprise funds, and detailed departmental budgets. No public comments were made.
Discussion Items
- Special Election Rescheduling: The Mayor announced a councilmember resigned effective April 6, 2026, creating a second vacancy. The City Clerk and City Solicitor outlined the legal timeline: a special election must be held within 90 days (by May 9) unless within 150 days of a regular election. To consolidate both vacancies into one election, the council considered postponing the existing special election (scheduled April 21) to May 8. This would reopen candidate filing through close of business Friday, April 10. Council members debated due process concerns (short filing window) vs. the need to fill seats quickly. The two existing candidates consented to the change. A motion passed unanimously (4-0) to postpone the special election to May 8, 2026, and direct staff to adjust all deadlines accordingly and maximize public notice.
- FY27 Proposed Budget – City Manager Presentation: The City Manager presented the draft FY27 operating budget. Key highlights: no fee increases; a one-cent property tax rate reduction (from 44.26 to 43.26 cents per $100 assessed value); general fund expenses up ~8% ($10 million). The budget adds 14 full-time public safety positions (5 for City Watch dispatch, 2 sworn police officers, 4 firefighter/EMT/paramedic). Police staffing increases from 124 to 126 sworn officers. The budget includes midpoint pay increases and a 3% COLA for general employees; FOP and IAF contract step increases. Fund balance stands at $42.7 million. The City Manager cautioned that long-term sustainability is challenged by rising public safety costs and that the tax rate reduction may not be sustainable.
- Budget Manager Presentations: The Budget Manager detailed fiduciary funds (pensions/OPEB), internal service funds (IT, purchasing, vehicle trust, risk management), and enterprise funds (water, wastewater, airport, golf, transportation, convention center). The airport is projected to be self-sufficient for the first time. General fund contributions to transportation decrease by $136,000; convention center increases by $216,000. Property tax revenue now accounts for 45% of general fund revenue (down from 53.5% 20 years ago). Room tax (increased from 5% to 6%) adds $5 million. Total general fund budget proposed at $130,554,569.
- Departmental Presentations: Departments presented their FY27 proposed budgets, including: Mayor/Council ($583,613, +$51k); Legal ($889,500, +$295k – includes attorney rate increase from $175 to $205/hr and higher litigation estimates); City Manager ($1,469,023, +$101k); City Clerk ($788k, +$90k – mostly election costs); Finance (increase ~$30k); HR ($38,612 increase for new HRIS system); Planning & Zoning (increase $91k – includes part-time environmental inspector); IT (increase $2.29M – includes moving internet/dark fiber costs, hardware/software increases); Purchasing/Service Center ($112,700 increase – building repairs); Vehicle Trust (increase from $2.9M to $3.5M – includes 12 police take-home vehicles, 8 police replacements, ambulance, refuse trucks, street sweeper); Risk Management (premiums up 4.7% due to new exposures; workers’ comp up 3%; legal budget up for pending claims; actuarial study; successful move to Legit for casualty saved $128k); Public Works Administration (10 divisions, $65M total – 33% of town budget; staffing at FY87 levels; highlighted Baltimore Avenue project advancing, wastewater treatment project); Public Works Construction (sidewalk replacement, equipment rental, vehicle purchases); Public Works Maintenance (boardwalk shower towers, pressure washer, Polaris, trailer); Solid Waste (tipping fees increase to $114.46/ton, new containers and trucks); Water (rate increases: usage +30¢/kgal, fixture +10¢, capacity +70¢; capital projects include 1st Street tower paint, 4th Street tank repair, SCADA upgrade, water main upgrade); Wastewater (rate increases: fixture +30¢, parking lot +75¢, pool +$1.55; capital projects include clarifier valves, lab equipment, VFD replacements, sewer lining, outfall inspection, Arctic Ave pump station design; rate study update commissioned); Transportation (personnel costs +10%, operating +1.7%; capital $2.4M for 4 buses (85% grant-funded); town contribution down $136k to $2.52M; app-based fare payment pilot planned); Parking (personnel costs -$37k due to moving to global payments; operating costs -10%; capital projects include new electronic sign and cameras at 4th/5th Street lot; inlet lot revenue down due to special events; overall surplus flat); Airport (two active grants for taxiway; staff static; fuel revenue stable; Phase 2 taxiway construction; zero general fund contribution); Engineering (beach replenishment budget increased from $430k to $500k; full project may require additional one-time funding; Caroline Street hardening; Northside Park projects).
- Capital Improvement Plan (CIP): The Public Works Director presented the FY27 CIP. $2.33 million from the Capital Reserve Fund is allocated for street paving, canal dredging, Caroline Street hardening, City Watch cameras, and Northside Park projects. The town’s debt is well below policy limits. Ongoing projects include paving, dredging, sewer work, and Montego Bay paving.
Key Outcomes
- Motion carried (4-0) to postpone the special election from April 21, 2026, to May 8, 2026, and to reopen candidate filing through close of business on Friday, April 10, 2026. Staff directed to provide maximum public notice via social media, newspaper, and direct calls to current candidates.
- The proposed FY27 budget was presented for discussion; no vote was taken. A budget wrap-up session is scheduled for the following day (April 8).
- The meeting ended without a formal adjournment due to lack of a quorum (only four members present; need four for quorum? Actually they had four, but the transcript suggests they couldn't adjourn? The final line: "We don't have a quorum to adjourn. So we're doing it." This likely means the meeting simply ended without a motion to adjourn.
Meeting Transcript
Go ahead. All right, good afternoon, everyone. I'll call the meeting to order. And I do have an agenda item that I need to add to this agenda. That's really why I wanted to have the recording. He resigned effective yesterday, April 6th, due to health concerns. So due to that, we now have two vacancies on the council. And I've talked to the city, talk to the city clerk, city manager, city solicitor, and it sounds like there is an avenue for us to have one special election. And we assume there's gonna be some questions about the timeline, Heather, if you could, or Terry, if you're prepared to speak about the timeline, if you could sort of outline that, and then I guess the council would need to weigh our options. I think as we saw last night, it's important that we have a full council so we can we can continue to have meetings. Um I'll jump in and if I say something incorrect, I'm sure the city solicitor will correct me. So there's two uh significant dates here that uh the council has to keep in mind. The first is that once a vacancy occurs, unless that vacancy occurs within 150 days of a regularly scheduled election, we must have a special election within 90 days of the vacancy occurring. So the first date to keep in mind is Councilman De Lucas resignation, which I believe will occur effective February 8th, which places the uh 90-day window on Saturday, May 9th. So that is the sort of first deadline. If we want to keep if we want to have both vacancies on the same ballot, that is deadline number one. Right now we have the election scheduled for April 21st, or I'm sorry, April 28th. 21st. 21st. It is 21st. Okay. Right now we have the election scheduled for April 21st. You can delay that election up to um, I think we determined May 8th, May 9th is a weekend. You might argue that uh because it's a weekend, you could push it till Monday, but I think in the interest of staying conservative, uh, we were looking at that May 8th date. So that's the first deadline. The second deadline is the uh deadline to file uh for a candidate. And that deadline is 28 days before the scheduled election. So for the April 21st, that deadline has already passed, obviously. Uh if the council wish to move the election to the furthest that they could, which we believe is May 8th, then that new deadline would be close of business this Friday for any additional additional candidates that wanted to file. So we would open it basically open it today and close it. Close the business on Friday. Would we need a special session to confirm the candidates on Friday? Or would we do that Monday or would we do that? I believe we talked about doing that on Monday, but I'll defer to the city solicitor. So yeah, we would do you would do a special meeting on Monday the 13th. Confirm if if there were additional candidates that file. Um the new deadline then for absentee ballot requests would be May 7th. An election day would be May 8th. Uh you would then need to have your special meeting to swear both council members in uh May 11th or May 12th, it would be your options there. Um, since your election day would be on Friday, normally we would do it, you know, normally elections on a Tuesday, and you do it on the Thursday. Um I have confirmed uh that we do have dockside hall at convention center, could be available for the election. Uh we do have a volleyball event in there, but we can work through that. We've done that in the past for early voting, so we would just need to trailblaze people from the front all the way back to dockside, which is the hall that overlooks the bay on the first floor. So it is a very tight deadline, but it is legally possible. Yeah, I mean, I don't think we want to have two special elections and we go path forward. Um anybody have a problem with that? If I have a question, I mean have it. I'm just gonna take a seat up here, I guess. Okay. We gotta talk about this.
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