Town Council Work Session
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Why was the budget presentation moved to tonight’s work session?
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All right, let us start tonight's town council work session. One item of business that we need to do tonight is that there is a good possibility that we may not be here tomorrow because of weather. And so I would like to see if there are four people that would be interested in moving the budget presentation that we would be getting tomorrow, moving it to today. There's no action required. It's simply a presentation with questions and answers. Are there four people that were willing to do that? OK. So we'll move that forward. And that is the first item for tonight.
And members of council, my apologies. You know, usually I get an extra day to prepare. And so remember on my grading curve of how well I do. And hopefully as I talk through this, my voice won't play out. So I'm happy to present to you tonight the proposed budget for fiscal year 2026, including the general fund, utilities fund, and our six-year capital improvement program. On a high level, where we start off looking at the budget, we are in good, strong financial shape. And you've known that. None of that has changed. We have the highest credit rating possible. All three rating agencies have given us the AAA ratings that we have. We have strong reserves. We have a strong financial portfolio. We're in good financial shape.
We're even stronger. with the now the completion of the annexation of compass creek and those revenues are starting to come in because we're able to get the job done by the end of the year and the properties in in our territory on january one so not using any data center funds but our all other taxes personal property taxes business taxes etc all play into this budget which are to our benefit You have a decision to make on the vehicle license fee. That will have an impact on this budget one way or the other. We have to make that decision, I think, by the 25th. We need to talk about the schedule now that we just, because the county is requiring, I believe, double check behind me, I think it's February 25th, we are to give them an answer.
So that may change your decision on your meeting schedule. Just realize that. But If you were to choose to eliminate or reduce the fee to zero, it's a $900,000 reduction that has to occur out of this proposed budget. Since I didn't have any direction prior, I had to include the $900,000 revenue in there, and there's corresponding expenditures with that. Overview of the budget. THE GENERAL FUND IS RISING FROM 82.5 MILLION TO 88 MILLION UNPROPOSED AND THE TOTAL BUDGET INCLUDING THE GENERAL FUND UTILITIES FUND AND THE CIP IS PROPOSED TO 158 MILLION. AND THE DROP IN THAT OF THE CUMULATIVE NUMBER IS CORRELATED BACK TO THE CIP AS PROJECTS go up and down in the CIP if they're completed, if they're pushed out.
That has an impact on the overall budget. So the CIP is always a moving target to some extent. But the one that gets most of the attention is the general fund, and then the utilities fund is consistent with your five-year rate study that you've already approved. In terms of our revenue, sources in the diversity our largest source continues to be our real estate taxes and this includes the taxes that we're now beginning to see out of compass creek overall if you look a little more micro level of our revenue sources the real estate because of the The Compass Creek, you see an increase projected of almost $4 million in real estate. Personal property tax increases are there as well, all to the positive benefit of the town.
So our assessments, and we'll talk a little bit later, are projected to go up overall about 8% for residential units. 6.7% for existing. That 8% residential is new and existing. 6.7% for existing average homes. Meals tax all continue to be about the same much on Target, BPAL, not a significant increase. And the hotel tax, our TOT tax, continues to climb. The area in red, that we've talked about the past that we're we're hurting from is to state tax for sales that's based on the school age population so as the county grows it's not that hard number of students are dropping but as the county grows our percentage of the pie reduces and that is the formula for the sales tax therefore we we're hoping that we're beginning to stabilize on the loss and that we can manage through that but that does have an impact on us.
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Agenda
8 items
1
Why was the budget presentation moved to tonight’s work session?
0:20–16:21
2
What decision is being considered for the vehicle license fee and its financial impact?
16:21–29:50
3
What are the three options for handling the vehicle license fee and the county grant?
29:50–43:45
4
Why are mobile vehicle barricades being proposed for downtown event safety?
43:45–57:54
5
How does the cost comparison between purchasing and renting barricade kits affect the budget?
57:54–1:08:44
6
What is the procurement process and timeline for acquiring the barricade kits?
1:08:44–1:19:03
7
What key legislative updates affect Leesburg’s budget and policies?
1:19:03–1:31:45
8
How does the council conclude the meeting and decide on next steps?
1:31:45–1:42:04
Speakers
6 identified
Kelly Burk 11 min
Neil Steinberg 5 min
Nicholas Krukowski 3 min
Zach Cummings 1 min
Todd Cimino-Johnson 1 min
Patrick Wilt 1 min
Officials recognised by voice; public commenters shown as “Speaker N” unless they state their name.