Jamie Munks
The State Journal-Register
The Springfield City Council on Tuesday passed a budget for the next fiscal year that includes a modest increase over the current year, body cameras for police officers, more money for abandoned building demolitions and funding for the Lincoln Funeral Coalition.
Aldermen last week tacked on another $53,000 to what Mayor Mike Houston had proposed for fiscal 2016, which starts March 1, and then passed the spending plan in a 9-1 vote Tuesday night. Ward 7 Ald. Joe McMenamin cast the only dissenting vote.
At the heart of McMenamin’s negative vote is the city’s police and fire pension debt, he said, calling it a “structural deficit” that needs to be addressed.
Aldermen last week voted to dedicate $20,000 to the Lincoln Funeral Coalition for its upcoming Lincoln funeral re-enactment event, and added $33,000 to the funding for ongoing abandoned building demolition efforts. The city has budgeted $488,000 for building demolitions in the coming year, which is on par with the original budget amount this year. But officials expect to be able to add more money to that through supplemental appropriations as the year goes on.
The inclusion of about 165 body cameras for the police department, and corresponding storage and management equipment, was a notable new initiative in the budget that largely held the line from the current year.
City leaders said when department heads submitted their initial budget requests, they were asked to cut them back by 5 percent. The city’s adopted corporate fund budget, which includes the majority of city operations outside of City Water, Light and Power, totals just short of $118.2 million.
Joe McMenamin for Ward 7 