The Springville City Council approved the overall budget for the 2022-2023 fiscal year during Tuesday’s meeting.

While a tentative budget was approved in early May and released to the public, budget planning began in December and January for many of the city departments, according to Bruce Riddle, assistant city administrator and finance director

Riddle gave a brief presentation, highlighting several aspects of the final budget to give members of the public an opportunity to comment on the final budget.

“The purpose of the meeting isn’t to go over the budget because that has been happening for months,” Riddle said.

The 2022-2023 general fund was approved at almost $36 million dollars. Riddle said there was a 7% increase in real growth from the previous year, with a prediction that the city’s population will grow in the next year. The city is also expecting to receive revenue associated with 500 new dwelling units.

City employees will receive a 3% merit pay increase, and employee benefits will be maintained as insurance costs did not increase.

Plenty of growth was budgeted into the city’s personnel. Additional hours have been added for several departments, such as administration, court, legal and the museum. The Springville Police Department dispatch will have one part-time position be converted into full-time, and one police officer and a part-time office assistant will be added. Administration and facilities departments will each receive a part-time employee.

A total of $7.7 million was budgeted for the general capital projects fund. Some of the high-cost projects include approximately $5 million for road construction and maintenance, $1 million for a flood protection program and nearly $800,000 for park improvement projects.

After Riddle’s presentation, no members of the public came forward to speak and the council unanimously approved the budget.

The council also approved an ordinance setting compensation for all Springville City officers and employees for the new fiscal year.

The mayor’s salary was approved, at approximately $19,000, and each councilmember atwill receive nearly $15,000 as pay. Riddle said all other city officers will receive compensation according to approved position list and paygrade table.

In other business, amendments to the current 2021-2022 fiscal year budget were addressed by Riddle.

An adjustment to personnel was made within SPD dispatch. Overtime pay was increased by $25,000 for the year. Riddle said the overtime pay increase was due to staffing shortages.

“The problem with our dispatch is that it’s open 24/7 and we can’t just not staff it, so we have had to rely a lot on our existing staff and pay them overtime to cover all the shifts we need to cover,” he said.

Another item was for the city’s recreational department. Youth sports ended up costing the city $5,000 more than was budgeted for the year. Riddle said there was higher participation than expected this year.

Two transfer items needed to be added to the budget. The first was approximately $2 million of surplus from the general fund into the golf fund, to offset costs of an irrigation project. The second item was a transfer of $1.5 million from the general fund into the capital improvement fund. Riddle said these funds were considered future surplus can can be used for future capital improvement projects.

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