Mayor prepares budget

Published 6:44 am Monday, March 3, 2008

LYNNWOOD — About $1.6 million for road and sidewalk maintenance, $575,000 seed money to kick start the city center and a $200,000 comprehensive transportation plan are among the city staff requests that Mayor Mike McKinnon is considering this week.

McKinnon is expected to present his budget proposal to the City Council on Sept. 7 when the mayor and Council gives the 2005-2006 biennium budget a tune-up this fall.

One of the biggest challenges is to find funding for about $2.6 million in capital project requests, said McKinnon. He is working with staff about funding options to share with the council.

“It is easy to come up with a list of projects,” the mayor said. “Now we’ve got to talk about how to fund them.”

The mayor is proposing the city council move about $60,000 to the general fund so the city’s economic development department can hire a city center manager next year. The new staff member would coordinate efforts to redevelop about 300 acres into a mixed-use urban center over the next 20 years. Known as the city center, the area is located roughly southwest of the 196th Street exit of Interstate 5.

Some of the items the mayor supports include: $200,000 to implement the city’s Technology Strategic Plan; a $50,000 study to consider building light rail to link the Alderwood mall, the Transit Center and city center; $45,000 to hire a part-time permit technician; $15,000 for North Lynnwood Park; and $10,000 for a bigger fireworks display in 2006.

The mayor also wants to move $88,000 from the program fund to the general fund to hire a full-time worker, who will work on neighborhood issues, support the Neighborhood and Diversity Commission and other projects.

The mayor noted there is a price break regarding employee benefits from the Association of Washington Cities which will save the city about $800,000.

In some cases, the city council is picking up where it left off last December. When the city council passed the city’s 2005-2006 budget last winter, they left at least $1.8 million worth of budget requests on the table including the road and sidewalk maintenance and city center seed money.

Now is the time for city leaders to reconsider, said Lynnwood finance director Mike Bailey.

“There are a lot of loose ends,” Bailey said. “Obviously, those are examples of things where the progress that was appropriate did not get made because they (the council) did not agree. They should have resolved them.”

The city’s street, sidewalk and traffic signal maintenance came to a halt this year because of last December’s decision, said Public works director Bill Franz. He is confident the mayor and city council will act.

“We fall a little further behind in the ongoing task of keeping up these systems,” Franz said. “If we get back on it, it (the consequences) will be negligible.”

The mayor’s short list does not include numerous requests from the Parks and Recreation Department, which the Council did not vote on in December. The list included funds to offer more programs at Cedar Valley gym and create at least four new positions: summer camp worker, park operations worker, marketing employee and senior programs coordinator.

Parks and recreation director Craig Larsen did not resubmit the request for the mid-cycle budget adjustment. A two-year budget is supposed to be a two-year budget, he said.

“It was resolved,” the parks and recreation director said. “I just think it wasn’t resolved in our favor. Whether they vote no or don’t vote, the result is the same.”

Park Department employees have learned to live without the funding by being creative and working harder. But there are limits to what people can do with limited resources, he said.

For instance, the council gave the OK to buy a $65,000 van for the senior center, but did not fund a dedicated driver, which would have cost about $25,000. City workers take turns driving the van for senior center events, Larsen said.

“You have to dig deeper than just the surface to know what is the consequence,” Larsen said. “If you don’t have people to work on things, they don’t get done.”