Minutes 05/13/2014 - Laserfiche WebLink

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May 13, 2014 "ORDINANCE TO APPROPRIATE THE SUM OF $378,935 IN THE OTHER FUNDS- SCHOOL ACTIVITIES FUND PORTION OF THE FY 2013-14 EDUCATION FUND." Ayes: Cherry, Edmonds, Meeks, Moody, Randall, Wright Nays: None 14 - 185 -Adoption of an ordinance to appropriate $229,963,046 in additional revenue and $229,963,046 in additional expenditures in the FY2013-14 Operating and Capital Improvement Budgets, to transfer $35,917,277 within the FY 2013-14 General Fund, and to reallocate existing appropriated capital improvements funds within the FY 2013-14 Capital Improvement Fund. Vision Principle: Efficient, Responsive Government. Background: • The City must amend the FY 2013-14 Budget to cover the revenue and expenditure for the Transfer of Pension Obligation Bond Proceeds to the Retirement Plan Administrator. In addition, the FY 2013-14 Capital Improvement Fund must be amended to reflect additional revenue and a transfer from the Behavioral Health Service Fund. An appropriation is needed for Federal and State Asset Forfeiture funds that have been received by the Commonwealth Attorney, Sheriff and Police Department. An appropriation is also needed to transfer funds from the OPEB Fund back to the Health Insurance Fund to cover expected costs. Finally, an appropriation is needed in the Debt Service Fund to reflect the cost of all City debt, including the Pension Obligation Bonds. Budget amendments are also needed to allocate the projected cost of the General Wage Increase for FY 2013-14, to transfer each fund's share of debt service to the debt service fund, and to reallocate project budgets within the Capital Improvement Fund. Discussion: • The City issued Pension Obligation Bonds in June, 2014. The proceeds from this issue, along with accrued interest, were transferred to New York Life, the City's Retirement Plan Administrator in August, 2014, after the Retirement Board completed its review of and adjustments to its Investment Allocation Plan. GAAP accounting requires that this transfer of funds be booked as an expenditure rather than a transfer of proceeds as is done in other bond issuances. An appropriation is needed to reflect the use of the bond proceeds and the corresponding expenditure to transfer the funds to New York Life. • Construction of the new BHS building is currently underway. The BHS fund balance will be used to pay for the technology costs associated with the new building, at an estimated cost of $1.5 million. An appropriation is needed to transfer this amount from the BHS fund balance to the Capital Improvement Fund. • The Commonwealth Attorney, Sheriff and Police Department receive asset forfeiture money from the Federal and State governments. The current total of those funds is $191,142. These funds need to be appropriated in the Asset Forfeiture Fund. • In FY 2010 and FY 2011, the City transferred at total of $5.5 million from the Health Insurance Fund to the OPEB fund. This caused the Health Insurance fund balance to be lower than needed to cover fluctuations in health care costs. The City has incurred shock losses this year, and $2.5 million needs to be transferred from the OPEB fund back to the Health Insurance fund to cover these additional costs. An appropriation is needed to transfer these funds. • City staff recommends that the City use an existing Debt Service Fund to account for the cost of all debt service payments in one place. Other funds, including the General Fund, that contribute to the cost of debt service will transfer monies to the Debt Service fund. The total cost for FY 2014 is not changing, but an additional appropriation is needed to establish the budget for the Debt Service Fund for the total amount of the City's FY 2013-14 debt service of $51,537,807.