Hoquiam’s cemetery fund and a proposed $8.39 monthly utility rate hike gave enough City Council members pause that they voted Monday to delay votes on a couple of agenda items regarding the 2017-18 budget until their Dec. 12 meeting.
The ambulance utility fee, which raises utility service fees from $11.83 to $20.22 a month for all properties, was announced at the last council meeting, but some members felt the public had not been given ample warning of the hike. A motion was made to table the issue until the Dec. 12 meeting, giving the public more time to comment before the council took action, and that motion passed. This rate fee raise would be in addition to the ambulance levy voters passed earlier this month, which added another 18 cents per $1,000 in assessed property value for the next five years, about $1.49 a month for the average home, according to city administrator Brian Shay.
The council also voted to put off a vote on an ordinance regarding the overall 2017-18 city budget, as the ambulance utility fee factors heavily into next biennium’s budget. They also wanted more time to look into the city’s cemetery fund, which is in need of a long-term plan, according to finance director Corri Schmid.
Council members asked about the possibility of contracting outside entities to maintain the facility and brought up telling the local high school they could fulfill their community service graduation requirement at the cemetery. As far as contracting, Mayor Jasmine Dickhoff warned “you have to consider the unions.” With high school volunteers, Shay told the council the city had reached out on numerous occasions to the school with “very few referrals.” He added that the city has been looking into “cutting back, contracting and volunteers” for the cemetery. A suggestion was made to use jail inmates, but the council and Mayor Dickhoff reported the cost of supervision of inmates would actually be greater than that of using city maintenance workers.
Council members did approve a temporary three-year interfund loan of $450,000 to expedite the purchase of a badly-needed new ambulance. They also approved a resolution to recover property taxes that were refunded or canceled, something called a tax refund levy. As explained by Schmid, “Refunds are due to changes in the assessment roll. They primarily include offsets like overpayments (someone paid too much but never claimed it) but also supplements (a reappraisal to a higher amount). There are also negative offsets for cancellations (senior discounts) and abatements (reductions in property values). The net of all of these we, as cities, call refunds. Refunds are annual opportunities and you can only collect them in that year.” The amount, just over $100,000, will be split between the basic, EMS and fire equipment funds.
