City being conservative in planning its future

By Lauren Radomski (Contact) | The Daily Journal

Published Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Mark Sievert

Fergus Falls aldermen and city staff are using conservative estimates of future growth and state funding in planning for the long-term.

Members of both groups met at a city council work session Monday to discuss the realities of the roughly a dozen projects aldermen prioritized in July. At the top is a long-awaited street repair and maintenance effort, which the city initiated this summer. Other projects include a new law enforcement facility, mechanical and electrical maintenance at City Hall, and a new ice arena.

In order to determine which projects the city can afford and how those projects will be paid for, leaders are using a financial management plan developed by city staff and Ehlers Inc. this summer. This plan maps out variables including city revenues, expenses and growth projections through 2016, and allows staff to see how tax rates would change as different projects are adopted.

On Monday, staff and councilmen looked at past residential and commercial growth in planning for future tax capacity.

The reality, said City Administrator Mark Sievert, is that growth alone is not going to cover the cost of the projects, as is sometimes the case in larger cities like Minneapolis.

“If we want these projects, we’ll have to be willing to pay for them,” Sievert.

And chances are, the city will have less help from the state in doing so. One of the assumptions in the financial plan is that Local Government Aid (LGA) will be unstable over the next several years.

“To try to factor in that it’s going to go up with modest increases over the years isn’t realistic,” Sievert said.

At the same time, the city predicts inflation will raise expenses by 5 percent each year from here on out.

“We’re not economists, here, but we’re trying to lay out our best estimates,” said Finance Director Bill Sonmor.

Monday’s session also touched on other variables influencing which projects are adopted and when. For example, the timelines for at least two city projects are dictated by the Fergus Falls school district’s building schedule. Last week’s announcement that the district is reverting to its original completion date of fall 2010 means sixth graders will be in Eisenhower School for another year, and any work on a future law enforcement facility at the school could not begin until summer 2010.

If councilmen should decide to help fund a new ice arena, planners will need to wait until students are out of Fergus Falls High School if they want the arena on that property. A group of city staff and residents who’ve been working on arena design with architects ATS&R and Bonestroo, an engineering firm, are scheduled to present their findings to the council in November. The cost of construction would be close to $7 million, said City Engineer Dan Edwards. The group is also compiling the costs of capital improvements to the current arena, he said.

Members of the city council did not make any decisions on specific projects Monday.