The Riverton City Council Tuesday night at a work session suggested some adjustments to their Fiscal Year 2024 preliminary budget, but left the total amount of $38,503.412 mostly unchanged.
City staff had proposed a cost of living increase of four percent for city workers, but Councilor Mike Bailey suggested that since the city has the funds, to increase that allocation to five percent. The remainder of the council and the mayor agreed, increasing the total salary line items by an estimated $70,000. Councilor Kyle Larson said the only way to have a good employee is if they are satisfied and can sustain their family. He said the city needs to take care of those individuals that the city is responsible for. You keep good people by paying them.
The city’s health insurance plan would be increased by 11.5 percent under the proposed budget. City Administrator Kyle Butterfield said the cost of living increase would be made possible by increased revenues and fund balances.
One suggested change to the budget was the elimination of funds to remove trees on the east side of city park so as to purchase a 200 gallon tank and boom weed sprayer for $12,500. Councilor Kristy Salisbury urged that change because it would lead to more efficient operation of weed control and could cover more ground. Mayor Tim Hancock, who joined the meeting via telephone, agreed. He said his conversation with Butterfield was that if the city is going to ask other to address weeds on their property, “we need to keep our own house clean. he said the city needs to do what we can to control weeds in alleys, and along our trails and such. The council provided direction to city staff to reduce the $30,000 tree removal project by $12,500 and to add that amount towards the weed sprayer.
The proposed city budget can be viewed on line at the city’s website, under the meetings tab.
Butterfield said the process is to have a public hearing and adoption of the budget on June 13th He said any other changes the council would like to make would be presented to them at the next meeting.