HUNTSVILLE, Ala — One item at last week's council meeting was hard to sweep under the rug as the motion to add more street sweepers brought a lively debate among councilmembers. It was proposed to purchase two street sweepers and two for every three successive years. In our discussion before the work session, councilman Bill Kling was hoping to add more. "The thing that i was involved in is a proposal that I've been trying to work on to get included in the budget ten street sweepers were two for each of the five districts so that all the city and all the citizens would benefit equally," Kling shared. "I thought that would be a good program."
While the sentiment was met with approval, the number asked was not and the council looked to compromise. "I guess it would be just an amendment to his amendment to split what was originally 2 million, I guess is two and a half now, but a million 1 year and a million the next," District 2 councilman David Little suggested. "And at least buy three machines and work towards the goal of having the coverage he’s wanting."
John Hamilton, manager of the fund would agree, siting the compromise leaves room to take care of other priorities. "So, what I'm suggesting is, yes, at that million level, then the other needs and the other priorities, I think we can also hit what we need to and not let any particular atrophy," Hamilton explains. "And that's what we have to be careful of, as if we invest too much in one particular functional area within the capital plan at the expense of others those others begin to atrophy."
After much discussion neither the proposed nor amendment to the proposal passed, but the need will still be addressed. "It is our intent very early in the fiscal year, with the approval of this budget to place on or three additional street sweepers, whether you all pass this amendment or not," Hamilton shares. "We are going to make prudent budgeting decisions relative to the needs of all of the various departments of the city and replace all of the fleet that needs it that we possibly can in. this particular case includes a minimum of three street sweepers."
Previous Coverage:
Mayor Tommy Battle introduced the City’s proposed Fiscal Year 2024 budget at the Sept. 14 regular meeting of the Huntsville City Council. On Sept 21st, the city council held a work session to discuss the details.
The mayor proposed a balanced $312,814,218 operating budget, which includes $33,053,691 million in special appropriations for 67 outside agencies. "So, the general fund is usually the largest fund in any city, and it is of the city of Huntsville," Finance Director Penny Smith shares.
The mayor says the budget focuses on "quality of life improvements" for the city. The budget itself is broken down into three categories. " Basically, there are three budgets.," City councilman of District 4 shares. "There's the general fund, there's the capital budget that deals with things like vehicles, and then there's the capital budget that deals with infrastructure, new road projects and the like."
When it comes to the general fund, Mayor Battle spoke to the importance of public safety. "Public safety is number one for our community and I think it's the first thing that we should always keep in," Battle shares. "Last year, 1% of the COLA would cost us $1.2 million. This year it's about $2.2 million and is in it's been done for the right reasons so that we can have public safety."
Also, the city is expected to see the growth in employment. "The growth and employment are for several reasons, like expanded routes for sanitation," Battle shares. "It's to add a crew for the fire truck, the ladder fire truck. It's to add more policemen to patrol the streets. It's to add for our bus system, for our rapid transit bus system, and to expand our bus systems into Sundays."
This year, it is proposed that the council authorized personnel in a total of 3209 positions, which includes both part time and full time. "Fire and rescue have 13 and this is to staff ladder 17, which will reside in Hampton Cove," Smith shares. "Police has 11 positions and this is just about growth in the city, both the size and population in order to care for the public safety needs of our city. Public transit is 17and this includes both part time and full-time positions for increased hours and routes of operation. Public works is 19, but 17 of those are sanitation employees, which fill three new routes created in our sanitation department."
Battle says this budget helps the city stay true to its commitment, the residents. "We feel like we're presenting to the citizens of this community what is needed to maintain a number one city status to be the best we can be, to provide excellent service, to enhance our quality of life, and to have efficient use of our resources."
Capital Budget:
Ditto Landing improvements is just one of the many items in one of two capital plans for this year's budget and both plans will address road improvements. "There are two capital plans," Director of Urban and Economic Development Shane Davis shares. "But they are very different in the type of capital that they truly fund for our city and our citizens to maintain and grow our infrastructure."
Both the 1990 and 2014 Capital Plan fund quality life improvements for the city which according to councilman Kling, the council very supportive. "Everybody was very supportive of the proposal for $19.3 million going into road resurfacing and street repair," Kling shares. "There would be 600,000 that would be going into sidewalk repair and construction. and that equals the record that we've had."
The proposed budget for the 2014 Capital Plan focuses on 4 things:
Transportation improvements
Economic development opportunities
Corridor redevelopments
Quality of life projects
"I think we're handling transportation very, very well, " Davis shares. "We're putting a lot of money towards that mid parkway, what I call the core of the parkway or the downtown core portion of the parkway, Joe Davis Stadium, Airport Road projects that we're seeing west of Research Park Boulevard, that we're going to need some infrastructure there to have some success."
Affordable housing is also addressed. "This is the thing that's at the top of our list, both the mayor's administration and Planning Community Development Office," Davis shares. "We're really close to bringing that to you. So, there's some funding to finish that. And then we'll try to figure out, you know, how do we start implementing that the right way in our communities."
The 1990 capital plan focuses on major infrastructure maintenance which included a street sweeping program. " There are two types of street sweepers that we need. one is a vacuum type and the other is the mechanical type," Hamilton explains. "We want to increase the fleet by two sweepers per year for the next three years. as part of that, we would establish a little bit of a backup fleet.