By Ryan Storz
The Bourbon Board of Aldermen held their second and final budget hearing last Tuesday night and are expected to pass the FY2011 budget at the next meeting on July 20.
Mayor Leonard Armstrong once again reiterated that the city’s sales tax revenue was low and expressed hope that Dollar General could help turn fortunes around.
Few changes were made to the proposed budget, presented first on June 8.
Expected income was raised for the municipal court by $9,000 to match expenditures, bringing the budget to just over $85,000 and matching last year’s proposal.
The budget will still contain cuts to the other six departments.
The park and sewer departments will see cuts of two percent.
A three percent cut is expected in the street department.
A four percent cut is expected for the water department.
City hall will get a seven percent cut.
The most severe cut will be in the police department. It will get a 17 percent decrease.
Alderman Stanley Bell wanted to cut an additional $2,700 from the police department’s budget, citing grant receipts from MoDOT.
“Why are we expecting it if we don’t have it?” he asked.
City clerk Cathy Bremer and Alderman Mark Hilse both tried pointing out that it was just a proposed number, but Bell wanted it taken off.
“It’s inflating the budget,” he said. “Let’s not have anything on that we don’t have.”
It was never agreed formally to have the item removed from the budget.
The city’s new backhoe will be an expense shared by the street, water and sewer department.
Alderman Hilse said that the board should commit to going over the budget once every quarter.
“We have to actually stick to it,” he said. “We’ve talked about doing it before, but we always start talking about other things.”