Skip to main content

Tag: Budget

Bradenton Beach businesses, residents to see increased fees

Written by Leslie Lake on . Posted in Bradenton Beach, Community News, Feature.

BRADENTON BEACH – To offset a budget shortfall of $350,000 from post-hurricane tax exemptions, city commissioners have voted to add revenue sources that include increases to short-term rental license fees, building department fees and parking ticket fines.
“As a result of the storms, our ad valorem revenue has gone down about 14% this year. To put a dollar figure on that, that’s $350,000 give or take,” City Treasurer Shayne Thompson told commissioners. “That’s driven mainly because of a Florida Statute that allows
for a property owner who can’t inhabit their home for 30 days or more to request an exemption on property tax.”
He said Manatee County has 11,000 people who have requested such exemptions this year. “What the decrease has done is leave the city in a position to have to replace $350,000 in addition to put some in reserves. As we’ve all seen, having a healthy reserve allowed us to
weather this storm better than most,” Thompson said.
He presented a plan that he said was multi-pronged and would raise revenue but not raise taxes.
“One of the prongs is our TPLE (Transient Public Lodging Establishment) license. We’ve had the same fee structures since 2017,” Thompson said. “The reality is we need to raise it.

We’ve come up with a hybrid solution that doesn’t impact the mom and pop that has a duplex that lives in half and rents half.”
He proposed the same fee structure, $150 per year, for a home that has up to four occupants.
“Each occupant above the four would be an additional $100 per occupant. That would shift the burden to, I hate to say it, but party houses,” Thompson said. “The ones that have the largest occupancy are the ones that also cause the most burden on infrastructure and staff.”
He said the city currently has 561 TPLE licenses. Of that number, 192 have four occupants or less.
He said the average occupant count is seven, and in applying the new fee structure, the average cost would be $450 for an annual license.
“In the opinion of staff, we don’t feel we’re burdening an investor,” Thompson said. “The reality is if you’re renting your property for $11,000, $450 or $600 per year won’t deter you from renting it.”
Commissioner Ralph Cole asked how this increase would affect hotels. Thompson said motels and hotels are exempt.
Commissioner Scott Bear asked how the fees compare to other Island cities.
“In Anna Maria they’re looking at redoing theirs right now,” Thompson said. “We’re about half of where they are right now. Looking at Holmes Beach’s model, theirs is current, and they charge $100 per occupant period.”
Thompson addressed the fee structure in the city’s building department.
“We last changed it in 2022. We now have more staff on board more than we had,” he
said. “Bill (City Building Official Bill Palmer) made me aware that by statute we can have reserves for operations of the building department equal to two years of expenses. In that hiatus of fees, we’re waiving fees due to the hurricane, it wouldn’t have put the building department in a deficit position, and we could draw on that reserve. Bill is looking at adding other fees that other cities have done.”
The moratorium on hurricane-related building fee waivers ends at the end of this month.
Thompson said there are some fees in place in Holmes Beach that Bradenton Beach could implement.
“For example, a stop work order in Holmes Beach, if they put a red tag on a door is $500, it they do it twice it’s $1,000. That will be part of the new increased fee structure,” he said.
Thompson said the fees will help build up a reserve so if another storm event comes, the city is not waiting for FEMA reimbursement.
“To bring us competitive with parking lots, we’d be raising the parking ticket fines from $75 to $100,” Thompson said.
He summarized the city’s goal with the increased fees.
“The goal is to put us in a position to break even. The city must have a balanced budget by
statute. And without raising taxes to get to that spot and put $300,000 give or take into reserves for next year. With those things it makes up for that shortfall and it keeps us in a healthy position.”
A motion to approve and direct staff to make changes as discussed for the 2025-26 budget was unanimously approved.

WMFR budget passes final vote

WMFR budget passes final vote

Written by SUN contributor on . Posted in Community News, West Manatee Fire Rescue.

BRADENTON – The West Manatee Fire Rescue District has put its financial ducks in a row in time for the coming fiscal year beginning Oct. 1.

WMFR commissioners met Sept. 7 for the district’s final public hearing on the proposed 2021-22 budget and to adopt a resolution certifying the 2021 fire assessment. No members of the public came forward to offer any comment on either item and commissioners passed both with a unanimous vote.

The $13,708,222 total budget includes $5,485,935 in total reserve funds, including impact fees, restricted reserves, assigned and unassigned reserves, $8,252,537 in total estimated revenue and $8,222,287 in appropriated expenses including all personnel services, operating expenses and capital projects.

The district’s new budget goes into effect at the start of the new fiscal year. Also going into effect on Oct. 1 is an amended contract with Chief Ben Rigney.

Rigney’s contract with the fire district was brought up for discussion during an August meeting where it was noted that a clause in the contract requires him to complete Executive Fire Officer training – the flagship training program of the National Fire Academy – before earning a raise. Prior to taking over the reins of the district from former Chief Tom Sousa in late 2018, Rigney was accepted into the elite training program. However, due to COVID-19 and a restructuring of the program that indefinitely shut it down, Rigney was only able to complete one of four sections.

During the Sept. 7 meeting, commissioners voted unanimously to accept an amendment to Rigney’s employment contract that removes the language requiring the EFO training to allow his raise to go into effect with the new fiscal year and adds two additional years to the original contract term of five years.

“Thank you for having faith in me over the past two years,” Rigney said, adding that he hopes to continue to serve the district for many years to come.

Related coverage

 

WMFR board may raise 2021-22 assessment rates

 

WMFR staff celebrates four promotions

Bradenton Beach budget

Bradenton Beach gets good budget review

Written by Joe Hendricks on . Posted in Bradenton Beach, Community News.

BRADENTON BEACH – City Commissioners praised City Clerk Terri Sanclemente and City Treasurer Shayne Thompson for the clean audit of the 2016-17 fiscal year budget.

On June 13, auditors Randy Dillingham and Jeff Gerhard reviewed with the City Commission the written audit report pertaining to the 2016-17 fiscal year that ended in September.

At year-end, the city had $6.25 million in cash, investments and capital assets. The city ended the fiscal year with a $2.25 million general fund balance and $262,850 in short-term liabilities. This resulted in $1.86 million being carried into the current 2017-18 fiscal year, with $552,143 of that in unassigned funds available for spending at the commission’s discretion.

The city received $2.74 million in revenues and had $2.81 million in expenditures. Dillingham said the city spent $68,900 more than it collected, but spent $285,664 less than originally budgeted. Dillingham said the general fund decreased by $157,038, which was less than $242,866 originally anticipated.

Dillingham said the city collected $195,736 less than budgeted, most of which was due to the one-year delay incurred when transferring stormwater fee billing from the city to the county. Dillingham said the budget would likely have ended with a zero deficit or a positive gain if not for that.

“We all understood that when the budget was adopted,” Mayor John Chappie said.

The Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) had a $1.47 million year-end fund balance that included $359,779 in CRA tax revenues transferred from the general fund. The Tingley Memorial Library had a $504,782 fund balance that decreased by $31,990.

“During the audit, we did have 10 adjustments to the statements. That’s a reduction. Every year it’s been going down,” Dillingham said of the year-end adjustments.

“You’re in good financial position,” he concluded.

Commission praise

“The last three or four years have been challenging,” Chappie said.

“When Terri came in, it (the budget) was in bad shape. An elected official was saying things weren’t right, the budget’s terrible. You guys stuck to the plan and the city is right where it needs to be. I want to thank you,” Chappie said to Sanclemente.

“Thank you for everything you’ve added for transparency and accountability,” he said to Thompson.

After the meeting, Chappie said former mayor Bill Shearon was the elected official he was referring to.

“We have a really good staff on board to take care of us,” Commissioner Ralph Cole said.

“We have a great staff,” Commissioner Jake Spooner added.

“I would like to thank all of the departments. We all worked closely together to make this happen. I want to thank the commission too because you’re a big part of what we do,” Sanclemente said.