{"id":9301,"date":"2014-06-09T10:08:08","date_gmt":"2014-06-09T14:08:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/?p=9301"},"modified":"2014-06-09T10:15:46","modified_gmt":"2014-06-09T14:15:46","slug":"valdosta-budget-hearings-vcc-2014-06-11","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2014\/06\/valdosta-budget-hearings-vcc-2014-06-11.html","title":{"rendered":"Valdosta Budget Hearings @ VCC 2014-06-11"},"content":{"rendered":"

\r\nHe also called to be sure LAKE got this,\r\nand the Public Hearings\r\nTuesday<\/a>\r\nand\r\n\r\nWednesday<\/a> at 5:30 PM are in the City of Valdosta’s\r\nonline calendar<\/a>,\r\nplus there’s\r\na much briefer story<\/a> in the VDT today, and see the millage table from last year’s budget hearings<\/a>. -jsq\r\n

\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nFrom: Tim Carroll <tcarroll@valdostacity.com>\r\n
\r\nDate: Wed, 4 Jun 2014 14:33:35 +0000\r\n
\r\nSubject: FY 2015 Budget\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nHey everyone,\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nIt is that time of year when your city government prepares its’\r\nbudget for the upcoming fiscal year. As we have experienced over the\r\npast four years, this year’s budget presents many challenges.\r\nRevenues continue to decline while expenses keep going up. Fuel\r\nalone for the city now runs around $1.7M per year and the power bill\r\nto run the city for a year is now at $3.4M. Like you have seen in\r\nyour homes and businesses, these and other costs continue to rise.\r\nMajor revenue sources such as the LOST tax (our largest revenue\r\nsource for the General Fund) continue to decline. And the list goes\r\non. The city has now tapped over the past several years all the\r\nreserve funds in or der to balance the budget. Those reserve funds\r\nare now gone.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nI say all this to illuminate the difficult choices that are present\r\nin this year’s proposed budget. While nothing is set in stone yet,\r\nthe proposed budget does include a 2 mil increase in property\r\ntaxes. A mil is worth about $1.45M in the city. 2 mills would cover\r\nthe budget shortfall plus allow a small contribution to rebuilding\r\nthe reserve fund. To put it in perspective—for the average\r\nhome in Valdosta, they would see an increase of $7.33\/mo or\r\n$88\/year.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nAll of you are very engaged citizens of our great city and I know\r\nmany will hav e questions as they should. With that in mind, I want\r\nto encourage you to attend the public budget hearings next week.\r\nJune 10th and 11th—5:30pm—City Hall, a complete and\r\ndetailed public hearing will be held about the proposed budget.\r\nVirtually all of your questions can be addressed during this\r\nhearing. Plus you will have an opportunity during the hearing to\r\nspeak. Mayor and Council will adopt the final budget during the June\r\n19th public hearing.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nThis will be the best opportunity to become fully informed. Please\r\njoin us. As always, I welcome any comments, questions or concerns\r\nyou may have. You can call or email me anytime.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nRespectfully,\r\n

\r\nTim Carroll\r\n
\r\nCouncilman District 5\r\n
\r\nCity of Valdosta\r\n
\r\n229.244.0928 w\r\n
\r\n229.671.1392 h\r\n
\r\ntcarroll@valdostacity.com\r\n<\/blockquote>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He also called to be sure LAKE got this, and the Public Hearings Tuesday and Wednesday at 5:30 PM are in the City of Valdosta’s online calendar, plus there’s a much briefer story in the VDT today, and see the millage table from last year’s budget hearings. -jsq From: Tim Carroll <tcarroll@valdostacity.com> Date: Wed, 4 […]","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[14,2,3,54,55],"tags":[7702,381,8704,8701,8699,10,8702,12,7,1247,722,1365,60,63,8700,6,8726,8727],"class_list":["post-9301","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economy","category-government","category-transparency","category-valdosta-city-council","category-water","tag-11-june-2014","tag-budget","tag-economy","tag-georgia","tag-government","tag-gretchen-quarterman","tag-lake","tag-lowndes-area-knowledge-exchange","tag-lowndes-county","tag-millage","tag-public-hearing","tag-public-hearings","tag-tax","tag-tim-carroll","tag-transparency","tag-valdosta","tag-valdosta-city-council","tag-water"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-2q1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9301","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9301"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9301\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9308,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9301\/revisions\/9308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}