Council considers using portion of LOST funds for public safety

By James Grob, jgrob@charlescitypress.com

The Charles City Council discussed the possibility of using a portion of the Local Option Sales Tax (LOST) for public safety at Wednesday’s work session.

The city will ask voters to approve a continuation of a one cent local option sales tax at a special election March 1 next year. In the past the proceeds of that tax have always gone entirely toward city streets and roadways.

Since the initial adoption of a LOST tax in 2004 and with a subsequent renewal of the tax in 2013, the city has completed over $20 million in street and road projects, equating to about 14 miles worth of street work.

“This revenue source is a critical part of our city street/road construction projects and is the major funding source,” said City Administrator Steve Diers. “The LOST has allowed much more street work to be done that we could have not gotten completed had there not been the tax.”

At a council workshop in October, however, Diers introduced the idea of possibly dedicating a portion of the option tax (10%, roughly $100,000 a year currently) to cover some general fund operational expense, specifically “public safety.”

Diers said the city has seen large increases in expense to proving ambulance services in the last few years in the community as well as some significant additional costs with providing policing. LOST funds can be used for any legal purpose of the city as approved by the voters.

New ambulance service costs are equal to $100,000 for fiscal year 2023, while policing costs are up $165,000, Diers said.

The city general fund is what currently covers the majority of expense when it comes to public safety operations.

“We’re seeing more demand on the general fund, and more than what can be generated in revenue,” Diers said. “Property value continues to steadily grow but not at a rate that covers the growth in expense.”

The consensus of the council on Wednesday seemed to be that 90% to 100% of LOST revenue could be used for roads and no more than 10% on public safety. A resolution will be written and presented at the next meeting. If approved, renewal of the local option sales tax will go to the voters for approval in March.

In other business on Wednesday, the council heard from Lance Aldrich, with FOX Engineering, regarding a change order for the water resource recovery facility (WRRF) project in Charles City.

The change order addresses seven items that have developed during the project’s construction, at a total increase in cost of about $51,000.

The change order has been accepted by Portzen Construction and is recommended for approval by FOX Engineering. The change order will be on the Nov. 15 meeting agenda for approval.

Also on Wednesday, the council discussed changes to the city’s credit card policy. The city intends to increase the maximum amount on the city credit card from $3,000 to $6,000, but eliminate use of the city card for meals, as there have been instances when the the city card was used to purchase a meal where alcohol was involved. This would prevent this from happening again.

The city would also add the city administrator to the list of people who can cancel card privileges for those not following the rules.