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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes - Finance and Bond Committee - 2/25/2008 Town of Oro Valley Finance and Bond Committee Special Meeting Hopi Conference Room 11000 N. La Canada Drive Oro Valley, Arizona Monday, February 25, 2008 6:00 p.m. SPECIAL MEETING CALL TO ORDER AT 6:07 p.m. ROLL CALL PRESENT: Tony Eichorn, Chair Chuck Kill, Vice-Chair Dan Toth, Member Peter Lamm, Member Bob Harris, Member STAFF PRESENT: Stacey Lemos, Finance Director Wendy Gilden, Management and Budget Analyst Craig Civalier, Public Works Aimee Ramsey, Transit Administrator Susann BeDell, Senior Office Specialist ALSO PRESENT: Lyra Done, Parks and Recreation Advisory Board Liaison CALL TO AUDIENCE No speakers. 1. APPROVAL OF MINUTES FROM THE JANUARY 28, 2008 MEETING MOTION: Member Bob Harris MOVED to approve the January 28, 2008 minutes. The motion was SECONDED by Member Toth. Motion carried 5-0. 2. DISCUSSION OF DEPARTMENT SERVICE LEVELS FOR THE UPDATE TO THE 10-YEAR FINANCIAL SUSTAINABILITY PLAN — PUBLIC WORKS AND TRANSIT Craig Civalier gave an overview of the Public Works department noting there are four divisions consisting of: • Design Review Division —employs six people Reviews development from a public works/engineering standpoint. • Operations Division — employs twenty-five people 2/25/2008 Minutes, Finance and Bond Committee 2 Consists of street maintenance, traffic engineering, Stormwater, and facilities maintenance. Stormwater Utility fees fund two Stormwater division employees. • Engineering Division — employs ten people Plans road projects and bridges and secures regional funding for projects. Funding sources for the Public Works Department come from the General Fund and the Highway Fund. The Public Works Department gets HURF funds of approximately $3M a year. HURF funds are used for the engineering division in maintaining streets, purchasing equipment and paying salaries. Pima Association of Governments (PAG) funds road extensions. Current funding available for the Public Works Department is already earmarked for specific uses. Regional Transportation Authority (RTA) Funds were used to rebuild the intersection of Lambert and La Cholla. RTA Funds will be used to rebuild Glover and La Cholla. No money from the General Fund goes to the Highway Fund. Chair Tony Eichorn asked how the State Gas Sales Tax is distributed. Mr. Civalier noted that it is based on gas sales in Pima County and distributed by population. He noted that the rest of the State's gas sales are going up and Pima County's gas sales are going down. They do not know the reason for this but speculate that it is not being reported correctly. Town of Oro Valley has asked the State to investigate. Mr. Civalier noted that surface treatment of streets has been cut back because of lack of funding. Wanted $1.2M for treatment, but only have $800K to spend on it. Would like to have $2M a year for surface street treatment. Town of Oro Valley has 368 lane miles of streets in Town. Member Lamm noted that we would be saving money in the long run if we spent the money to do all of the surface treatment that needs to be done every year instead of cutting back. Noted that the money is just not there to be able to do all of the streets. Ms. Lemos stated that she would be research the budget impact of the Finance and Bond Committee's idea of issuing bonds to pay for bringing the Town's roads up to a condition index of 70 or 80, and analyzing the Highway Fund's ability to pay for debt service on those bonds and an annual fog sealing program to keep them from deteriorating. Ms. Lemos noted that the road and sealing project bids are coming in under budget. Chair Eichorn asked if Council has ever voted on General Funds going into the Highway Fund. Helen Dankwerth, Council Liaison, noted that it had not happened in the four years she has been on Council and does not see it happening in the near future as the 2/25/2008 Minutes, Finance and Bond Committee 3 money is just not there. Ms. Dankwerth noted that it is her opinion the roads are a safety issue. • Transit—employs twelve people Coyote Run is a demand responsive service that operates Monday through Friday from 8am to 5pm. It carries residents who are 62 yrs or older or American Disability Act (ADA) eligible. Every month passenger trips are increasing. 30% of Oro Valley population is over 62. Operates about 900 hours a month. Nine of Eleven drivers are part time. The dispatchers can also drive. They take the radios and schedules with them and drive if necessary. In town it is a $4.00 round-trip and as you go farther out from the town it gets more expensive. All passengers are charged the same amount with the exception of certified low-income passengers. Passengers must not be able to drive themselves. We have three vehicles as it is required by law that we have a backup vehicle and not miss a run. Coyote Run would like to expand its days and hours of operation. Anything that they want to expand, they find a funding source for. Funding comes from the Local Transit Assistance Fund (CTAP) and the Federal Transit Assistance (FTA). They purchase the vans through the LTAF grants because they are not reoccurring costs. They purchase the van and then reapply and hopefully the additional funding will purchase the replacement van. The vans must be replaced every four years or 100,000 by FTA guidelines. General Fund also contributes to Transit approximately $300K per year, most of which goes for the operational costs. The Freedom Grant will go toward a transit coordinator to help with the RTA services. The Freedom Grant is time-limited and the RTA picks that up when it comes up. Coyote Run funding is about $2.4M over 18 years. The Town is going to receive two express services from SunTran. One will go downtown from the Rancho Vistoso area and one that will go to Raytheon. Three trips a day and it should start early next year. 3. DISCUSSION AND REVIEW OF LAST YEAR'S FINANCIAL SUSTAINABILITY PLAN AND RECOMMENDATIONS TO THE TOWN COUNCIL Ms. Lemos summarized last year's Finance and Bond Committee recommendations to the Mayor and Town Council as outlined in the Committee's packet. It was decided to keep the same format as last year. Areas of focus will be the Highway Fund and the General Fund, and the Committee will look at assumptions in both funds and update them. Will work on updating this and will bring this back as an agenda item to next meeting and hopefully have some numbers updated in terms of revenue estimates. The Committee will give input on a likely economic scenario, an optimistic and a worst- case economic scenario. 2/25/2008 Minutes, Finance and Bond Committee 4 Chair Eichorn asked if the State can withhold funds from municipalities. Ms. Lemos stated no, not unless legislation to do so is enacted. 4. COMMITTEE MEMBER/COUNCIL MEMBER LIAISON REPORTS Parks and Recreation Advisory Board (PRAB) Liaison Lyra Done stated that she had nothing to report to the Committee. 5. SCHEDULING NEXT FINANCE AND BOND COMMITTEE MEETING Next meeting scheduled for March 31, 2008 at 6:00 p.m. in the Hopi Room. 6. ADJOURNMENT MOTION: Member Lamm MOVED to ADJOURN the meeting, SECONDED by Member Harris. The meeting adjourned at 8:18 p.m. Prepared by: f� Susann eDell Senior Office Specialist