Meeting Report, June 28, 2007

I just want to give a quick report on the council meeting. In a word, booooooooring. And I mean that as a compliment. I think a boring meeting is a sign of good governance. Business is taken care of quietly. Important things are presented with full information allowing informed decisions. Controversial items are handled with delicacy and without backroom agendas. All in all, I think things are recovering nicely. Attendance is down. I was late due to a prior engagement. When I arrived, there were maybe a half-dozen citizens. I think all votes were unanimous.

OK, what did they do? I did not attend the curfew public hearing. Council was kind enough to listen to my opinion at the last meeting. Council approved the curfew at the regular meeting. I think it is a bad idea, but I don't have kids that would be affected, so it makes little difference to me. But look at the situation. If you consider the troublesome years to be the teens and the troublesome gender to be boys, the curfew does not impact many. Furthermore, the serious problems are often caused by kids over sixteen that are not covered by the curfew. I estimate maybe 140 kids from 13 to 16 in this town, 70 boys. If half of those boys are never a problem, then the ordinance that was just passed is aimed at 35 boys in Marfa and misses the bigger problems from boys over 16. Instead of cooperation, it creates confrontation with the police, perhaps a game of late-night hide and seek. The Sentinel listed a number of legal exemptions to the curfew. Smart kids will laminate a copy of that list and keep it with them. But hey, that's just the opinion of an overly opinionated blogger. That and a dollar-fifty will get you a large cup of tasty coffee in this town.

The grant-related agenda items went smoothly and quickly. One item was tabled because of some confusion. The Farm Service Agency resolution passed easily. There was a long presentation from WTU Retail about a contract for electricity. In the end, the council voted to accept a 59-month contract at 9.09 cents per kWh. WTU Retail also agreed to credit us for about $1700 in late fees we have paid in the last six months for late payments. They also promised to waive the late fees for the next three months if we got current on our bills. If the city was in such great shape as the administrator bragged in late May, why were the electric bills and garbage bills going unpaid? Anyway, we stand to save about $2500 in late fees by signing up with them again, that equals one month of severance. Couple that with a rumored $2,000 a month dining/entertainment charge on the city credit card, and I could make the case that the city is actually cash-flow neutral after getting rid of the administrator even including the severance pay. Thanks to Mayor Dunlap for wearing mayor and admin hats in the transition.

On to the 05-06 budget. I apologize to all those that glaze over when I talk about this. I cannot help myself. Council adopted a true and accurate copy of the 05-06 budget based on research done primarily by me and Mayor Dunlap. Council also voted to have that small part of the audit fixed for as little as $300. If anybody had any doubts about the degree of shenanigans going on with the previous administration, ask me to explain it in detail. The short story about the 05-06 budget is this. After council made a voice vote on October 19, 2005 to some verbal changes, someone at the city entered almost all of those changes into the budget computer and made a printout that the Mayor found in his office. The only two line items that were approved but not entered were revenue increases for gas company revenue and insurance recovery totaling $96,000. The problem is that without those two changes, the budget showed an improper surplus of $25,000 and with those changes, the budget showed a seriously improper surplus of $120,000. My guess is that somebody did not want council to see that, so nothing was shared with council for ten months and even then, it was still wrong.

A budget surplus of $120,000 should have been corrected by increasing expenses (e.g. safety equipment for public works or raises for employees), or by decreasing revenue or both. A balanced budget is a requirement. The city must raise funds for everything in the budget; the city cannot budget excess revenue for expenses not in the budget. The city is largely funded by property tax and profit from the water, sewer and garbage bills. Property taxes bring in about $300,000 with about $100,000 going straight to repay debt and $200,000 going to the city. If that budget surplus had been corrected by simply adjusting property taxes, everybody would have seen a 40 percent decrease in property taxes that year. Of course the city is terribly underfunded, so that would be a bad idea. The point is that the budget process was poorly documented and council was not informed of the actual budget for the entire year while $96,000 in certain revenue was hidden from the budget reports. I don't know about you, but that makes my head spin! I don't know why none of our officials of the time noticed the problem or attempted to correct the situation. That's money under the bridge now. I am happy that council is correcting those mistakes and clearing the bad odor left over from the 2005-2006 budget fiasco.

Mayor Dunlap gave a report on the interlocal agreement for the gas company that comes up in March. Councilmember Garcia has some strong opinions that I support. There are those that want to turn the gas company into a revenue stream to fund city government. This is a regressive form of taxation. Garcia is adamant that the purpose of the gas company is to provide cost-effective and safe energy to the citizens with a non-profit company. If you don't want to see your gas bills increased to fund the cities of Alpine and Marfa, let him know that you support his efforts.

I for one am completely pleased with the professional cooperation of the current administration. How about you?