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Ms. Watson stated if you look nationally, a thirty percent reserve would be <br />wonderful but is actually fairly low for larger cities. She said some cities have fifty <br />percent or more in their General Fund. <br /> <br />Mr. Price asked Ms. Watson why she had never told the Council that previously. <br /> <br />Ms. Watson explained that many of the larger cities have a 50% fund balance <br />and that is really why they did not have to make reductions like U City has had to <br />make. <br /> <br />Mr. Price asked which larger cities was she referring to. <br /> <br />Ms. Watson said larger Cities like Maryland Heights and Chesterfield. Mr. Price <br />asked if we checked right now, they would have fifty percent in reserves and Ms. <br />Watson noted some would. Mr. Price asked Ms. Watson if it was information she <br />just found and she said she saw it in a survey. .Mr. Price said in the previous <br />budget studies, she never said this, so he was confused. <br /> <br />Ms. Watson said she didn’t believe anyone had ever asked her what other cities <br />had but thirty percent would be considered a healthy fund balance. The City will <br />be use $1,000,000 of that for the flood buyout but 30% would be a healthy fund <br />balance. <br /> <br />Mr. Glickert noted the U City Council accepted a seventeen percent Reserve and <br />knowing that Chesterfield has a fifty percent fund balance and just recently laid <br />off more than what U City has. So he said fifty percent, thirty percent, it really is <br />what percent of the budget that is important to the Council as far as reserves are <br />concerned. It might be something we need to look at in the future because we <br />have never specifically looked at what dollar amount would be needed as a <br />comfortable back-up. <br /> <br />Mr. Sharpe said when the City’s reserve fund was at twelve percent Mr. Wagner <br />on the council was very set at having a larger reserve and suggested it be raised <br />to seventeen percent. Mr. Sharpe stated that is how the seventeen percent <br />came about. <br /> <br />Mr. Crow was more concerned with what the City’s bond rating was. <br /> <br />Ms. Watson said the City had a good rating; there are better ratings but the City <br />does have a good rating because of things the City is doing. She said they <br />looked at the City’s fund balance and looked at several different ratios. Ms. <br />Watson believed it was the things the City is doing that are causing that rating to <br />be good. She said it was not necessarily projecting for the future of difficult <br />times, but rather how the City will be able to react those difficult times. Ms. <br />Watson said the fund balance grew due to the one-time cell phone payments. <br /> <br />Mr. Crow ask to get information on our bond rating as compared to other cities. <br /> <br />Mr. Kraft said he guessed the issue of where the reserve might be going - one <br />million dollars going to the flood buyout, 350 thousand dollars is going for the <br />3 <br /> <br /> <br />