After three months of workshops, special meetings, and a retreat, the Town of Highlands unveiled its proposed 2023-24 operating budget on Thursday night.
The total budget is $32,011,478.
Town manager Josh Ward explained that the budget is balanced, as required by the NC Local Government Commission, and revenue neutral based on the recently completed property tax revaluation completed by Macon County.
“The total value of property is $2.8 billion and with an estimated collection rate of 98 percent, that does lead to a change in the tax rate for this year,” Ward said. “The current ad valorem tax rate is 15.24 cents per $100 of value, and the new tax rate will be 10.22 cents per $100 of value in order to remain revenue-neutral.”
Ward explained that the proposed operating budget includes appropriations from several of the town’s fund balance and enterprise funds, including $2,098,020 from the general fund balance, $1,664,128 from the electric fund, $802,930 from the water fund, and $439,550 from the sanitation fund.
The only enterprise fund that did not finish the current fiscal year in the black was sanitation, which tallied a $164,000 shortfall. The proposed budget also includes approximately $300,000 to replace one of the towns large rear-loading trash trucks.
“Going forward I would recommend that sanitation be put in the general operating budget and thus no longer be an enterprise fund,” Ward said. “Sanitation needs to be looked at as an expense because that fund is simply not going to make money, or even break even.”
The town’s general fund balance sits at $5 million and the general fund reserve is also at $5 million. The electric reserve fund is approximately $6 million according to Ward.
Within the budget are $8.3 million in approved capital projects. Ward noted that $3.9 million of that is carryover from the previous year when several projects were not completed due to supply chain issues which effected delivery times for major components at the water plant, sewer plant, electric department and also delayed the delivery of several vehicles.
“We have had a few of those items come in just in the past month, so we will be paying the invoices for those and you will see them come out of the budget prior to its adoption next month,” Ward said. “The new belt press at the sewer plant is one of those big ticket items that took a lot longer to receive than we expected, but we have it in place now and that amount will be removed from the budget for next year.”
The operating budget also includes a five percent cost of living adjustment for all town employees in order to offset a rising insurance premium in 2023-24.
A public hearing on the budget will be held in June and the board could adopt the budget as soon as its June 15 meeting. The budget will take effect July 1.
Poplar Street water line replacement
“Basically, we have been dealing with this for two years,” Ward said. “We got money from the federal government to do a $100,000 water and sewer project in town and the project we chose was to put water lines and add fire protection on Poplar Street. It’s been a long process dealing with all the red tape that went along with that funding, but we are ready to move forward.”
The low bid for the project came from Stillwell Enterprises at $168,000 and a resolution presented on Thursday night awarded the bid.
Commissioner Amy Patterson asked where the extra $68,000 to complete the project was going to come from in the budget, and Ward explained that the town has known for two years the $100,000 grant would not cover the entirety of the work.
“This has taken so long to get going, our initial estimate was $125,000 two years ago,” Ward said. “That cost has gone up over the past two years as the cost of everything else has gone up.”
Ward noted that the balance of the bid is written into the 2023-24 operating budget for the water department.
New town attorney.
Ward introduced Bob Hageman of Poynter Spruill Law Firm as the new town attorney.
Hageman was logged in to the meeting via Zoom.
“I really appreciated meeting with all of you last month when I was in Highlands, and I look forward to working with the town,” Hageman said. “I’d love to come out for every meeting but that five and a half hour drive is a little more than I want to bite off. But I’m available for any questions this board may have and I will be available via zoom.”
The board welcomed Hageman and proceeded to ask him questions throughout the meeting.