Finance Meeting Today at 2

The last Finance meeting before the budget will be presented to the Full Council will be held today at 2 P.M. in the Kalamalka Room at City Hall. The staff should be bringing forth their cuts, revenue increases and reserve funding sources that they recommend to be used to meet the Council's target of a 2.84% increase from the current 6.81%.

I expect that they will come up with the 1% cut to departmental spending that they were requested to do that was ratified by a 6-1 vote on Monday. I expect them to use the enough of last years operating surplus of $780,000 to meet their target. They will also use these funds to cover the monies to be requested for the temporary Woman's shelter.

Hopefully I will hear debate on the Airport Capital Reserve request for 2007 and the RCMP reserve and the sleight of hand that occurred there. The following are questions that I expect to find the answers to at this meeting or will have to ask at the required PUBLIC INPUT meeting that will follow:

1. Will the proposed budget with all its line by line detail including reserve transactions and its projected balances etc. be poster online for public scrutiny before the public input session? (I realize a more modest scaled down version will be available at the door of this meeting)
2. What is the Airport Bank Balance at Dec. 31, 2006 ? More or less than Capital Reserve?
3. What is the Airport operating budget that will be required for 2007?
4. How will the accumulated deficit on Airport's books of $98,498 to 2005 year end and any loss for 2006 affect the 2007 budget?
5. Will the Airport Capital budget be left at $300,000 and combined with the remaining $113,333 be used to pay for the Taxiway Charlie Extension at an estimated cost of $415,627 ?
6. Will a business plan be presented to justify this expenditure and to indicate the increased revenues that will flow through to the shareholders?(Taxpayers)
7. The commissions from fuel sales was $46,765 in 2004 and decreased to $8,284 in 2005 but was augmented by a net $40,315 in fuel sales. ($287456 - $247,141 (cost)) leaving us with fuel sales of $49,097. What are the fuel sales net revenue in 2006 and what is the # of years to make the $176,646 Fuel Del system capital expenditure payoff?
8. Will the sleight of hand in which $350,000 was removed from the budget of the RCMP long after the taxpayers had been taxed for it instead of going into Reserve be acknowledged ? In my opinion the operating surplus of 2007 will stay the same but one of its major components should be this $350,000 which normally would have been dedicated and available in the Policing Reserve Account.
9. What is the amount going into Policing reserve at 2006 year end and will there be a detailed accounting of its opening balance as well as any uses in 2006 etc such as bylaw officers $311,409) , or Restorative Justice Program ($44,820)etc. ? How much of this balance will be used to reduce 2007 policing costs?
10. Did the monies received by the City of Vernon for the ticket revenue ($860,111 since 2004) flow through the Reserve account to provide a proper audit trail?
11. What is the budget for the Vernon Land Committee for 2007?

When I see the detailed budget I am sure I will have other questions to d0 with the Terasen Gas Legacy fund as well as the Franchise Fee on this utility.

I hope to post an answer to most of my questions later tonight.

1%= $147,000 (actually 146,882 {141,826*102.84})