The Free Press, Mankato, MN

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September 8, 2009

North Mankato approves cuts

By Brian Ojanpa

NORTH MANKATO — The North Mankato City Council has approved a proposed 2010 municipal budget with $220,000 worth of nips and tucks.

The Council action Monday to trim that amount from various city departments is in response to a common bane among virtually all Minnesota cities — reductions in state aid.

North Mankato’s proposed unallotment in Local Government Aid in 2010 is nearly $500,000, representing a 9 percent reduction.

The proposed cuts range from reductions in overtime and temporary employee hours to elimination of school crossing guards to wholesale cutbacks in street seal coating.

When Mayor Gary Zellmer wryly commented that the proposed budget is devoid of fat, City Administrator Wendell Sande’s retorted ruefully: “If there was any fat, it’s long since gone.”

The proposed general fund budget for 2010 is $5,517,650, a .55 percent decrease over the previous year.

The proposed tax levy for 2010 is $5,015,287, a 7.3 percent increase over the current year. That would translate to a 3 percent increase in an individual’s property taxes.

The proposed 2010 budget does not include salary increases, with the exception of the police union, which is in the third year of its contract providing a 3 percent salary increase.

The budget proposal does not call for any employee layoffs or furloughs.

A small consolation in city budgetary matters occurred this summer with the municipal swimming pool.

Even though revenues were $4,000 less than projected, expenditures came in $28,000 under projections, the result of salary savings due to a glut of cool-weather pool closings.

Unseasonably cool temperatures prompted the pool to be closed 24 days out of a possible 79.

The Council again will discuss the budget Sept. 15, Oct. 5 and 19, and Nov. 16. The deadline for state certification of the final tax levy is Dec. 29.



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