City Council Committee Agendas

Mount Vernon City Council Finance Committee Minutes January 25, 2017 Present: Councilmembers Fiedler, Hulst, Hudson, Lindquist, Molenaar, and Quam Staff present: Doug Volesky, Chief Dodd, Peter Donovan, and Chief Brice 1) Minutes from November 2, 2016 were approved. 2) Doug provided an overview of the Finance Department, its vision, mission and goals as well as the department’s organization chart. a) The department will review the vision and mission statements to be sure that they correspond to the City and Council vision and mission statements. b) Each staff position was briefly reviewed. c) The primary deliverables and responsibilities were summarized. d) The 2017 goals include upgrades to systems and processes within the department. 3) Doug provided an update on the 2016 major governmental revenues. While the 2016 financial data is unaudited Doug presented the following: a) The 2016 property and sales tax collections were above budgeted estimates. REET I and II, fuel tax and Criminal Justice taxes were also above budgeted estimates. Utility taxes, Public Safety (Jail) sales tax and other miscellaneous taxes were below budgeted estimates. In total the taxes collected were $808,730 above budgeted estimates. b) Sales tax revenue for 2016 was $6,561,334 which is a 12.3% increase over 2015. c) Utility tax revenues for 2016 were $275,900 over 2015 collections which is a 7.4% increase. The PUD revenue accounted for $139,685 of the increase. d) Building permit activity is steady. 4) New REET reporting requirements were passed by the State Legislature that limits the amount that can be used for maintenance to 25%. The road work that the City does is not considered maintenance. The new recording requirements will require Council approval and it is to be part of the budget process. These new rules were passed during the 2015 legislative session, but do not take effect until January 1, 2017. 5) 2016 Financial statements should be ready by the end of April 2017. Adjourned at 6:35 p.m. Submitted by Rebecca J. Wade