Sheldon, Iowa — At Wednesday’s meeting the Sheldon City Council scheduled a Budget Goal Setting Session for December 11th. They also held a brief budget workshop following Wednesday’s council meeting.
That workshop included of a brief review of the city’s budget for the fiscal year ended June 30th, which included higher than expected revenues, and higher than expected expenditures. City Manager Sam Kooiker appeared on the KIWA Morning Show Thursday and explained where the additional revenues came from.
Kooiker says the Road Use Tax is a gasoline tax, and is apportioned to the cities. He also gave reasons for the increase in the Hotel-Motel Tax revenues.
On the other side of the balance sheet, the City had some expenditures that were more than had been budgeted for. This time they were more than offset by the higher than expected revenues, but that may not always be the case. We asked Kooiker what would happen in a hypothetical year in which revenues weren’t sufficient to cover expenditures.
Kooiker pointed out that Sheldon’s property tax levy for the next fiscal year, which is $15.31, is eleven cents per thousand dollar valuation LESS than the levy for fiscal year 2003-2004, which was $15.42 per thousand dollar valuation. He says the city is very fiscally conservative.
On the subject of those three properties on which the City is accepting bids, Kooiker says he’s optimistic, especially after seeing the price that was paid for the old DOT shed on Business 60 South earlier this week.
