Midville passes balanced ’06 budget





Midville council members call for change when it comes to city spending.

After extensive planning for spending cuts, city council passed the nearly $350,000 budget for 2006 at their monthly meeting last Monday.

Norma Thorne and Larry Williams voted to approve the plan and Sam Cummings abstained from the vote. Scotty Womack was absent.

While council held a planning session in January to discuss strategies to cut spending, Cummings said he felt like there were more issues to be resolved and chose not to vote.

Reeling from debt handed down by previous administrations, current council members have shouldered the responsibility to recoup the city’s financial viability.

Members rolled up their sleeves at the January session to comb through the budget and eliminate unnecessary expenditures and explore new options for necessary spending.

Council voted last Monday to set hours for city employees at 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Council members cited concerns about employees coming in as early as 6 a.m. and “waiting on daylight.”

While spending cuts prevailed and Thorne declared the budget balanced at the end of negotiations, council granted increases in the administrative department, police department and the water and sewer department.

Thorne attributed increases in the administrative department to rising health care costs and the cost of training for city clerk Carolyn Estes.

Salaries made up most of the increase in the police department’s budget, which Thorne said was significantly underestimated in the past.

The city must also shell out more money for additional testing in the water system as required by new regulations handed down by the Environmental Protection Division.

Budget planning marks the council’s first step in treating the town’s financial woes.

Council plans to tackle past due water bills next, an issue which recently brought controversy to the Waynesboro City Council.

In the other business, council:

 Held the final reading of the city truck ordinance and set its effective date for Feb. 21;  Discussed additional testing and procedures for the water system.

 Approved drafting a liquor ordinance for referendum.

After a closed session, council appointed Williams to oversee the street, water and sewage departments.

The Midville City Council meets the first Monday of every month at 6:30 p.m.


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