PORT ANGELES — City Council members reviewed a preliminary $108 million budget for 2016 this week that is built in part on staff reductions, consolidating city prosecution and jail services, and cuts to youth and family recreation programs.
Council members also said more taxes could be in store.
Some of the cuts would be in funding for United Way, the Olympic Peninsula Humane Society and the Feiro Marine Life Center.
“This is pretty critical to our operations,” Feiro Executive Director Melissa Williams said Wednesday of the facility’s possible loss of $22,000 in city funds over the next three years.
Like Feiro, the Humane Society and United Way also would lose city-based funding between 2016 and 2018, based on the council’s budget priority-setting sessions held earlier this year.
Feiro operates in a city-owned City Pier building for which it does not pay rent, and the nonprofit organization is conducting a feasibility study to build a new marine life center.
“We definitely need to step up and find new [funding] sources, so it just means more hard work,” Williams said.
City officials faced a $940,000 shortfall in August, the majority of which consisted of $660,000 in lost electric tax revenue, City Manager Dan McKeen told council members at a special meeting Tuesday to review the preliminary 2016 spending plan.
The shortfall was fueled by Nippon Paper Industries USA, which consumed 60 percent of power citywide before shutting down one of two paper mill runs.
Council members agreed at the meeting to review, after Jan. 1, possible voter-approved sales tax increases for 2016 to fund street repairs and police and fire protection services.
Public Works and Utilities Director Craig Fulton, Fire Chief Ken Dubuc and Police Chief Terry Gallagher said Tuesday their departments are all in dire need of funding.
But discussion of a 2016 property tax increase is imminent — as in next week.
At a public hearing and first reading next Tuesday of a new ordinance, council members will consider increasing property taxes by the 1 percent allowed without a vote of the people — an increase also imposed for 2015.
The increase would raise $43,000 in revenue next year.
The council meeting next Tuesday will include a discussion of the new prosecution and jail services contract with the county.
It begins at 6 p.m. at City Hall, 321 E. Fifth St.
Hearings on the proposed budget will be Nov. 17 and Dec. 1 at meetings beginning at the same time and location.
It’s also where council members and department heads met for three hours this past Tuesday to review the proposed 2016 spending plan during presentations by McKeen and city department heads.
The $108 million citywide budget, which includes $19.8 million for general fund day-to-day, non-utility operations, would decrease 26.3 percent from the 2015 amended budget of $146.4 million despite encouraging upticks in lodging tax proceeds and construction, city officials said.
But the general fund would decrease far less in 2016 — by 1.3 percent, or $261,000.
The spending plan includes some capital projects, much of it grant-funded, including $453,000 to replace Civic Field lighting, $500,000 to repair the Marine Drive channel bridge and $460,800 for designing improvements to Race Street.
The city would realize 2016 savings from cuts in youth and family programs and less power purchased from the Bonneville Power Administration, McKeen said.
The city also would lose 4.85 full-time-equivalent positions in 2016 in the parks and recreation, finance and legal departments.
Fulton said no major road repairs have been funded since 2010.
He suggested the council consider creation of a voter-approved transportation benefit district that would levy a sales tax of up to 0.2 percent in the city limit that would not apply to groceries and gas and add 2 cents to every $10 purchase to fund street improvements.
Council members, who would have to authorize its placement on the ballot, viewed the tax increase in a positive light.
Councilman Brad Collins said he “strongly favors” such a tax, noting that many visitors drive through Port Angeles to Olympic National Park.
Council members also discussed increasing the Medic 1 utility rate 15 percent on top of the 5 percent increase already planned for 2016 for the fire department and a 0.1 percent voter-approved sales tax increase that could be shared by the police and fire departments.
It would add 1 cent to a $10 purchase and generate $250,000 a year.
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
