It’s City Budget Time in Denton!
Admit it, it’s your favorite time of the year – after months of planning and anticipation, the Denton City Council has officially started its deliberations on the Proposed Budget for the 2013-14 fiscal year.
One of the biggest formal powers of this elected body comes with our “power of the purse.” Here is where our policy guidance can have dollar figures attached to it. And because these are ultimately YOUR dollars (the bulk of the city revenue feeding our General Fund comes from the city’s portion of Sales Tax and Property Taxes), it is important for you to get informed and participate in the budget process.
Click here to access a big PDF containing the City of Denton proposed budget. It can appear complicated if you are not familiar with the city budget, but it has some self-contained Cliff Notes for you. Try just reading 5 pages, 15-19, which is the City Manager’s message – it is a great overview of the big aspects of the budget. Then, if you want more, I’d read the section from 29-55 to get some in-depth insight into the main numbers and budget priorities.
Back in mid-June, I released my budget recommendations for this fiscal year – you can see them here. It is important to note that there are several needs in the community that are important and deserve attention and only so much money to go around. This year alone, various city departments and City Council submitted over $7 million in supplemental budget requests (new items), yet there is only a bit over $1 million available for new items. Nonetheless, I am happy to report that this proposed budget includes $20,000 for Economic Development programming targeting entrepreneurial efforts, startups, and local small business development. In an attempt to address the desire for training and workspace for entrepreneurs, the Library team has developed some really innovative ideas to use its space and resources and we see money allocated for a community-accessible 3D printer and software toward this end (you want to make things, they can help). The Public Art Master Plan is also being funded out of savings identified from the current fiscal year 2012-13.
I have more thoughts on all this and recommendations as we move forward. This is just the beginning of the process. The budget will not be approved until September 17. In the meantime, I’ll be posting some of my thoughts and perspectives on this year’s budget and where I think we ought to be heading economically. Read up and stay tuned…