Tuscaloosa City Council Finance Committee Meeting - April 21, 2026
Tuscaloosa City Council Finance Committee Meeting - April 21, 2026
The Tuscaloosa City Council Finance Committee met on April 21, 2026, to approve donations, budget revisions, and receive the annual comprehensive financial report for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2025.
Consent Calendar
- Minutes Adoption: Minutes from the previous meeting were adopted.
Discussion Items
- Donation for Hope Summer Jobs Initiative: The Tuscaloosa City School System donated an additional $10,000 (third consecutive year) to the Hope Summer Jobs Initiative. The initiative funds 55 students for seven weeks at a rate of $13.25 per hour, including insurance. The city requested authorization to accept the donation.
- General Fund Budget Revision: Two-part revision: (1) acceptance of the $10,000 donation and budgeting to Hope Summer Jobs Initiative; (2) budgeting a cooperative maintenance agreement with Al Dot (total $61,240) – revenue only, no expense increase, as work is already underway. The revenue will be added to contingency.
- Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR) for FY Ended September 30, 2025: Lucas Hand of Malden & Jenkins presented a clean, unmodified audit opinion with no material weaknesses or significant deficiencies. Key highlights: the city received the GFOA Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting for the 38th consecutive year; total assets and deferred outflows were $1.46 billion; cash and investments $412.6 million; total liabilities and deferred inflows $868.5 million; revenues $330.3 million (flat from prior year); expenses $284.2 million (increase from $275.1 million); ending net position $592.8 million (increase of $48.2 million). General fund revenues were $194.1 million (taxes $111.8 million, licenses/permits $31 million, intergovernmental $26.6 million); general fund expenditures were $200.6 million (public safety 39%, public works $38 million, general government $29.3 million, agency distributions $15.1 million). The general fund had other financing sources of $16.5 million (transfers in $23.8 million, transfers out $13 million, SBITA issuance $5.7 million), resulting in a net increase of ~$10 million. Unrestricted fund balance was $36.5 million. Water and sewer enterprise fund held $550.9 million in assets, $215.7 million in liabilities, net position $334.9 million, operating revenues $83.4 million, operating expenses $47.2 million, net change $27.6 million.
- Surplus Calculation: Ms. Standridge explained the city code requires a 20% reserve of the prior year's operating budget. This year, unassigned fund balance was $46 million; 20% reserve required $34.726 million; available transfer amount was $11.277 million. A proposed $1.841 million additional reserve for next fiscal year (Fiscal 26) would reduce transferable surplus to $9.435 million to the General Fund Reserve Future Improvements fund, combining with closeouts to total $12.053 million.
Key Outcomes
- Donation Approved: Motion to accept the $10,000 donation passed unanimously.
- Budget Revision Approved: Motion to approve both parts of the budget revision passed unanimously.
- Annual Report Accepted: The annual comprehensive financial report was accepted with praise for the finance team's performance. No controversies noted.
- Surplus Calculation Noted: The surplus calculation was presented; no vote was taken. Ms. Standridge indicated the mayor used the $12.053 million figure for his capital project presentation.
Public Comments & Testimony
- No public comments or testimony were recorded.
Meeting Transcript
Entertain that okay motion. Second, all in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Minutes are adopted. Item number one. Let's see. Authorization of acceptance of donation for hope summer jobs standards. Good afternoon, Council. Good afternoon. For I think for the past two years, and this is the third year in a row, the Tuscaloosa City School System has given the City of Tuscaloosa another an additional ten thousand dollars towards the Hope Summer Jobs Initiative. And this is the same $10,000 that they are offering to donate to the initiative, and we are requesting authorization for acceptance of that donation. And I assume we'll have a full presentation on the Hope Initiative at agency funding time. Well, and I think that so Mr. Howell mentioned earlier this week that RFs are due in. They were due Friday. Give us just a top level five liner appearing, please. No, you can't uh since you're invited me. Um but we actually the we actually issue the request for qualifications on April the 5th, 4th or the 5th, and we they were due back this past Friday at 4 p.m. and we received uh I want to say two um proposals, and so we were actually evaluating those proposals, and so we will introduce those to you in probably the next projects committee. Okay, and these proposals are to manage the proposal and ballpark remind us how many is it all students or just all students, yes sir. And with this extra about how many ballpark do we fund it'll be about 55 students. 55, yes, sir. Okay. And last year we were we had um actually um 55, and we had several kids from every one of your districts we represented. Yes, yes, 55, and that's for how long? It's for seven weeks. Seven weeks. What rate? Uh 1325. 135. And it's including the insurance contribution as well. Okay, thanks. All right. So we have before us a motion to accept money. Motion. Second, all in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Money is accepted. Thank you very much, school assistant. Item number two, Ms. Standricks. Yes, this general fund budget revision is in two parts, and it will be and it is attached to your handout. Um, the first part is accepting that $10,000 donation and budgeting to the Hope Summer Jobs Initiative line item to increase that by the same $10,000. The second part of the budget revision being requested is to budget the cooperative maintenance agreement with Al Dot that uh Mr. Thompson briefed you on in projects committee. That is a total of $61,240. Now we will not be increasing an um expense line item. We are just going to be increasing the revenue and then putting that amount to contingency.
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