MEEKER I Following their regular Tuesday meeting, Meeker’s Board of Trustees stayed late to consider the town’s 2021 budget. Facing an estimated shortfall of more than $1.4 million, the Town expects to dig into reserve funds during the next fiscal year, but not without making a few capital improvement sacrifices first.
The single largest item trustees and staff proposed to cut from the budget was the Meeker High School sidewalk project, for which the town had initially budgeted $240,000. Trustee Pat Turner suggested pushing the project out another year, noting that MHS students “haven’t had a sidewalk there for over a hundred years.” Other trustees agreed the project wasn’t especially urgent, and that the cut was necessary.
Town Manager Lisa Cook, who put together the 2021 Budget, initiated discussions on many of the cuts. One of those was for the $50,000 Business Grant program, which Cook said had “lost its luster over the years,” citing lack of participation with the program as one reason to cut it. Trustees agreed.
Cook later noted that the cut would not apply to funds that had already been granted in 2020, and that the program could come back or get “revamped” after 2021.
In discussing some similar discretionary and case-by-case expenditures, Trustees agreed to cut the Community Improvements budget in half, from $60,000 to $30,000. In 2020 the fund helped to pay for an SWCA River Design Study, contributed $3,000 to the “Admin Playground” and put $1,000 towards banners in the downtown area.
The marketing and economic development line item was also cut by $20,000, from $35,000 to $15,000 for 2021. Trustee Scott Creecy said the original purpose of the line was “”to piggyback on stuff the county was doing.” The Town has spent less than $5,000, about half of which went to a promotional video for snowmobiling produced by a small YouTube channel. The town also purchased a quarter page ad in the 20th edition of the Northwest Colorado Hunting Guide.
Nearly $24,000 in cuts were proposed for two items in the police department budget. First was for detox, for which the town had consistently budgeted $3,700 annually, but Cook said the town has not paid for detox any time in recent years that she could remember, so it was cut entirely. Also cut entirely from the PD budget was $20,000 for employee recruitment. Instead, the town is budgeting a $4,500 hiring incentive under salaries for the potential new-hire of Meeker’s would-be sixth police officer.
In the Public Works department, urgent Third Street improvement projects remain in the proposed budget, with others getting cut, for now. At the request of town staff, trustees chose to fund the water loadout building and welding hood projects next year, at a combined cost of about $83,000. Trustees then cut $63,000 budgeted toward an overhaul of the Public Works department’s Third Street shop.
In one of the only back and forth discussions of the evening, Lisa Cook asked trustees to consider if they’d like to continue subsidizing the the recycling program at a cost of $21,600 annually.
Trustee Wendy Gutierrez wanted to cut the subsidy entirely, saying, “We’re at a place now where if we’re going to start tightening our budget, and with the limited hours that they’re open out there, I’m OK with not subsidizing it any longer.” She elaborated on her lack of support by talking about how the recycling drop off location on County Road 15 was not open during hours that people needed to use it, like evenings or weekends.
Trustee Pat Turner argued that having a recycling program would be an important recruiting tool for bringing new residents to town, and suggested continuing the subsidy for at least another year.
Other trustees fell in the middle of the discussion, and ultimately it was decided that the recycling program subsidy would be cut by $6,600 to a total of $15,000 for 2021, assuming the (contractor) was willing to renegotiate.
Before the meeting ended, Trustee Scott Creecy asked Town Manager Lisa Cook about the proposed $50,000 budgeted to contribute to maintaining the local dispatch center, asking if Cook believed that amount would be enough. Cook was uncertain, but warned trustees that if the town had to pay more towards dispatch, that it could “throw all of our hard work out the window.”
Town staff and trustees are still just getting started in the budget process. So far they have proposed just over $400,000 in cuts to their 2021 budget. The proposed budget with trustee approved amendments goes back before the board Oct. 6, and a public hearing will be scheduled for November before final adoption.
By LUCAS TURNER | [email protected]om
