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Thursday, May 01, 2008

Edgewood's Sewer First on Funding List

By Lee Ross /
Mountain View Telegraph
      The Edgewood Town Council took it's first stab at creating a budget for the upcoming fiscal year on April 23.
       The council's first step was to list expenditures in order.
       “I think of these not only in what's desirable, but what's doable,” said Councilor Glenn Felton.
       The town sewer was listed first, then the police department, roads, animal control and finally recreation.
       Completion for the town's wastewater treatment system, which town officials have said may be completed by the end of this year, was given a price tag of about $4.6 million.
       To cover the remaining cost there was some discussion of obtaining a loan, which could be from $2 to $4 million, at 3 percent interest.
       Although most of the numbers discussed were estimates at best, the town would pay interest on that loan, along with other recurring expenses, from an estimated $180,600 in monthly revenues to the town.
       One of the big unknown quantities is how much tax money will come from the newly opened Wal-Mart.
       Mayor Robert Stearley said he expects the first tax returns from the big-box store to come in by the middle of May. That revenue may be just after the town's final budget meeting on May 14. Because the council had no solid data on what the revenue stream Wal-Mart will produce, they left the figure at zero.
       The bulk of the discussion at the meeting was about another unknown quantity: the town's new police force.
       Stearley said, for now, the strategy will be to cut funding from the police department budget, then add that money back in as the Wal-Mart revenue comes.
       Edgewood Police Chief Paul Welch told the council that to staff the department with two officers per shift all day seven days a week the town would need to hire nine officers.
       “The serious calls are the ones that require two police officers,” Welch said. “No police officer in his right mind is going to walk into a domestic dispute without backup.”
       He pointed out that, with fewer officers come sacrifices. The choice may be whether to have more officers in the daytime or at night. He said that most burglaries of peoples' homes happen during the day, when people are at work, but businesses are more vulnerable at night, when they are closed.
       Even with two officers, one may be working on a single case, such as a drunken driver, all night.
       According to Stearley's figures, which did not include an estimate for gross receipts from Wal-Mart, hiring nine officers would create a $363,508 deficit in the town's yearly recurring funding revenue, while hiring six officers would create a $123,556 deficit.
       Welch said that he will not likely be able to hire a full police force until July. The town's fiscal year begins on July 1.
       Felton supported the chief's apprehension about hiring officers.
       “You and I both know, even if we set this at nine (officers), they're not going to fall out of the sky,” Felton said.
   

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