25LINKBUDGET(FULL) - Flipbook - Page 15
City of Plymouth 2024 / 2025 Budget
City Manager’s Budget Message
The financial state of the City remains stable, and we are maintaining a solid General Fund
Balance. We currently have an upgraded Standard and Poor’s Bond Rating of AA+ with a stable
outlook. The City Charter requires that the administration deliver a balanced budget to the City
Commission. At the same time, we need to acknowledge that we will likely see changes in a
number of revenue and expenditure sources that are being impacted by high inflation, limits on
revenue generation, staffing challenges and continued supply chain issues that are because of
the COVID-19 Pandemic. While the supply chain issues have gotten a little better over the past
year, we still have multiple items affecting our operations and some economists are predicting
some type of recession over the next eight to twelve months.
Headlee Amendment and Proposal A will continue to impact our revenue sources now and into
the future. This year we are limited to a 5% growth in revenues rate, despite inflation operating
at a much higher rate. As a result, homeowners will see an increase in their tax bills, despite a
lower City General Fund operating tax rate. In addition, we will be reducing the millage rates
for debt as our bond issues will not require as much millage support to pay them. This will mean
that eight of the last ten years in a row, the city has reduced the millage rates charged to
the property owners. There is still seems to be no real desire in Lansing to fix the broken
municipal financial model with Proposal A and the Headlee. amendment.
One issue that has already been and will be significant in the new fiscal year, is elections and the
election process. The costs of providing safe, secure elections have skyrocketed and since the
new requirements for additional in person voting time, absentee ballots, election security issues
are all new requirements of the State of Michigan and they should all be reimbursed to the city,
under the terms of the Headlee Amendment. It remains to be seen if the state will find a way to
“wiggle out” of their responsibilities under Headlee. We are still waiting for reimbursements for
the February election. We anticipate that the November election will be an “all hands-on deck”
event over multiple days for city staff in all departments.
The Pandemic provided us a number of unique opportunities to show that local government can
adapt and overcome “on-the-fly.” Some of those changes have remained in place, such as the
Santa arrival at neighborhood parks and the Memorial Day Procession. The pandemic also taught
us to continue to partner with both the private sector and our local service clubs to the benefit of
the community. In short, the pandemic showed us that we are a results-based organization, not
a processed based organization. We have the ability to adapt and overcome.
As usual, we anticipate that this budget will be subject to our normal quarterly changes as we
progress during the fiscal year. We are continuing to look at alternative funding or grant
resources where we can.
We are genuinely concerned about the 35th District Court as they will soon be a significant
expense for the city, as they are continuing to operate at a deficit. The Court is independent of
the city, and we do not control their operations. It should be noted that we predicted that there
would be no need for a third judge and related staff in 2001 and 2002 and that the cost of adding
a judge (in 2003) would lead to a situation where the court became a cost center for the city. In
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