Council Member at Large Kim Ecklund presents budget amendments at City Council voting session (November 28, 2022)

There will be no tax increase and no parking meter increase in the 2023 City Budget passed by Jamestown City Council.

There were 27 amendments voted on by Council.

Finance Chair and Council member at Large Kim Ecklund said some of those amendments were to deal with $400,000 in issues she found while analyzing the budget, “As many people know, I’m a numbers person and I asked for the nitty gritty, down to every line item in the budget. And going through each line item and each detailed item in that budget instead of just the book you have seen, I analyzed every line, every expense from expenses to salaries and found some things that were missed, some things that were doubled, and some whatever the case may be. And to that tune, it was roughly around $400,000.”

Ecklund said the amendment to cut $157,500 from the Bond Principal line is an example of an issue she found, saying that amount shouldn’t have been included in the budget.

Jamestown City Council amendments to 2023 City Budget

One of the amendments approved reduced parking meter revenue by $127,000. That amendment was directly correlated with cutting a proposed increase in downtown meter rates from 25-cents to 50-cents a half hour.

Council member at Large Jeff Russell said you often see higher parking fees in other larger cities, “You know, I don’t think we’re always like other major cities. We’re hopefully in the tail end of the Pandemic and we’re out of that. I don’t think it’s fair to be pumping this money into our businesses, through ARPA funding, and then turn around and raise meter rates and discourage people from coming downtown.”

Council also approved an amendment increasing the Jamestown Police Department‘s budget by $40,000 to allow them to purchase a new car. Council member Marie Carrubba, who introduced the amendment, said this was to help get the department on a rotation with replacing vehicles.

Other notable increases to department budgets through amendments included adding $46,926 to the Police Department’s salaries line to address concerns by the Police Chief that the SWAT Team, training and education, an K9 Handler lines were underfunded. Council also added a total of $54,000 to the Fire Department‘s equipment lines to aide them in purchasing new turn-out gear for 10 firefighters and to replace ropes for bail-out gear.

Council also added a total of $20,000 back into the Parks Department‘s Flags and Banners and Horticulture supplies lines. Both had been totally cut in Mayor Eddie Sundquist‘s proposed budget. Parks Manager Dan Stone had said in his budget presentation that without the horticulture funds, he couldn’t purchase flowers, shrubs, or mulch for flower beds or flower pots in the city.

Council approved raising the projected sales tax revenue line by $75,000.

Ecklund said increasing that line is a gamble, “I have concerns and I’ve made that clear to every council member in this process that although I’m willing to accept it and move forward that you don’t know what the economy to do next week, much less next month. I have concerns because inflation is still high, gas prices are high, the sales tax (holiday) is coming off at the end of the year, discretionary funds could change. Will gas prices, taxes go up? What’s that balancing act?”

Council did have to approve allocating $54,879.20 from the General Fund Balance in order to have a budget with no tax increase. With that allocation, that leaves the fund balance total at $5,828,590 dollars.

Council President Tony Dolce said while American Rescue Plan funds helped purchase a lot of equipment earlier this year, there were still items council wanted to include in this budget “So it just took some jockeying around a few different lines. And again, there were some mistakes that were found in the budget that had to be rectified, so it took time to rectify those mistakes and adjustments and different things, particularly in Public Safety, that we felt the turn-out gear for the Fire Department, the vehicles for the Police Department, those type of things that are important to the community.”

Mayor Sundquist now has five business days to submit any vetoes of those amendments. By City Charter, Council then has until December 15 to vote to override any of those vetoes.

Jamestown City Council

Mayor Eddie Sundquist‘s $38.68 million Executive Budget proposal included no tax increase. The tax levy is proposed to remain at $23.69 per $1,000 of assessed property value, which it has been since 2020. It has a 0.06% increase in the overall levy.

Council members have raised concerns over a proposed parking meter rate increase. The budget has on-street meters rates rising from 25-cents to 50-cents a half hour, for a total of $1 an hour. The parking revenue budgeted for 2023 is $245,000 versus $127,000 for 2022, a 31% increase.

Police Chief Tim Jackson also raised concerns over the SWAT Team, training, and K9 handler being underfunded.

There are also have been concerns over the need for additional staff for Information Technology Services. Information Technology Director Mark Dean informed Council that his request for an IT Specialist was not funded in the Executive Budget. He said the $42,634 for the additional position is needed to handle cyber security needs and network hardware-software needs.

Finance Chair and Council member at Large Kim Ecklund had expressed concern over departments doing their own tech work when there are staff assigned to handle that already.

Council must vote on a budget by December 1 or the mayor’s proposed budget goes into effect.
Council also will vote on several American Rescue Plan funded projects that have been languishing on their agenda for months.

Resolutions to be approved include $1.5 million for a Non-Profit Assistance Program program, $1 million for the Chautauqua County Land Bank Post-Pandemic Housing Initiative, $750,000 for a Business Expansion & Building Acquisition program, and $500,000 for the 19A Homeownership Program.

The proposed amount for the 19A Homeownership program has been reduced by $250,000 with another resolution re-appropriating that amount to the very popular Senior Citizen Home Improvement Incentive Program.

Council also will vote to approve a local law on the Reapportionment of Ward Boundary lines.

City Council will hold a work session at 7:00 p.m. in the 4th Floor Police Training Room with the full voting session taking place at 7:30 p.m in the Council Chambers on the second floor of the Municipal Building. The meetings are open to the public with the voting session being livestreamed on jamestownny.gov.

Jamestown Mayor Eddie Sundquist presented his 2021 city budget last Thursday. The $34.86 million spending plan reduces appropriations by 4.5% and also includes an estimated 0.72% reduction in property taxes. But the budget also has increases in other revenue lines.

According to the mayor’s budget presentation, Sundquist is calling for increases in parking violation rates, on-street rates at parking meters, and also increased rates at parking lots and garages.  The total increase in revenue is projected for the three categories is $519,000, $68,000 more than what had been budgeted in 2019 (the final full year before then novel coronavirus pandemic began).

WRFA reached out to the mayor’s office on Friday to get specific details on just how much the various rates would be going up and we are currently awaiting a response. However, we can compare the projected total revenue increases for next year.

• For parking violations, the mayor is calling for an 11% increase in revenue (+$24,000) over 2019 . However, that is still 5.4% (-$14,000) lower than the revenue that was originally projected in the final 2020 budget.
• For On-Street Parking Meters, the mayor is calling for an 18.5% increase in revenue (+$29,000) over 2019.
• And for Parking Lots and Garages, the mayor is calling for a 21.5% increase in revenue (+$15,000) over 2019.
  We are comparing the numbers to 2019 instead of 2020, because of the current year being impacted by COVID-19.

Other proposed revenue increases in the city budget for next year that come from fees and other charges set by the city include:

• Fire Inspection fees (+$28,000 from 2019)
• Building Permits (+$16,000 from 2019)
• Park Fees (+$10,000 from 2019), and
• The leasing of city property/space (+$13,000 from 2020).

The mayor’s budget didn’t indicate if the Fire Inspection, Building Permit, or Park fees were going up due to proposed rate increases, or due to increased demand. The rental income from leasing city property is most likely contractual and built into any lease the city has with its various tenants.

The complete city budget can be found online at the city website. The Jamestown City Council will begin reviewing the budget later this month and is required to adopt a final spending plan by the end of November.

A map depicting the current layout of parking spaces in downtown Jamestown, as of November 2017. Recommendations from the city’s ad hoc downtown parking committee would make several changes to downtown parking, including the removal of the two-hour free parking zone in the heart of the downtown.

JAMESTOWN – After nearly a year-and-a-half of meetings and research, the city of Jamestown’s ad hoc Parking Advisory Committee has come forward with recommendations on how to improve parking in the downtown.

During Monday’s Jamestown City Council work session, representatives from the committee were on hand to provide a report that highlighted solutions to the problems and challenges associated with downtown parking as it relates to people who live, work, and/or visit the downtown.

The ad hoc committee was established by Mayor Sam Teresi in July 2016 to study downtown parking and bring forward recommendations. the committee was comprised of representatives of downtown businesses and destinations, along with city officials.

• READ FULL POWER POINT PRESENTATION OF RECOMMENDATIONS

Among the solutions that were brought forward:

• All two-hour meters converted to three-hour meters.
• All exceptions to remain in place (i.e. 30-minute meters, load/unload zones, handicapped spots etc.)
• All non-lease surface lot meters converted to 12-hours.
• 12-hour meters will be placed on the outskirts of the Central Business District (i.e. 5th and 6th Streets)
• Improve the fairness of enforcement by eliminating the confusing “courtesy zone” [“Free Zone”].
• Clarify parking regulation signage throughout the former “courtesy zone.”
• Current “courtesy zone” spaces converted to three-hour meters.
• THERE WILL BE NO INCREASE IN PARKING FEES!
  • Parking ramp and lease space rates will remain the same.
  • Fees will remain $.25 per 1⁄2 hour, $.50 per hour for Central Business District and 12-hour surface lots.
  • Fees for 12-hour, outskirt meters will be decreased to $.25 per hour.
• Make paying for parking convenient and flexible by installing multi-function, “smart” meters.
  • Continue to accept coins.
  • Accept credit card payments.
  • Set up a pay-by-phone app that is integrated with or independent of “smart” meters.
• Implement a more user-friendly signage system for lease/non-lease spots in surface lots.
• Implement signage program to easily identify public parking facilities.
• Design and implement a wayfinding system to lead motorists to attractions and long-term parking for those attractions.

All recommendations will be presented to the city’s Strategic Planning and Partnership Commission on Thursday morning, Nov. 16 and will then be considered by city lawmakers for possible implementation, most likely next year.

Vehicles should park only on the odd-numbered side of the street during odd-numbered months and only on the even-numbered side of the street during even-numbered months. Vehicles should be moved at 10a.m. on the first day of each month.

The rule will remain in effect until the end of September.

Following the conclusion of the Ticket Amnesty Program earlier this year, all fines and fees were reapplied to the base amount of a vehicle owner’s outstanding tickets. The city has resumed its normal collection efforts, which includes, but is not limited to, submitting motorists’ names to collection agencies, reporting violators to the Department of Motor Vehicles, and continuing the vehicle towing and booting program.

City officials say there are approximately 7,000 outstanding parking tickets that total more than $400,000.

Anyone with outstanding parking ticket should visit or mail payments to the City Treasurer’s Office or visit the city website at www.jamestownny.net to pay online.

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The proposal was brought forward by Jamestown mayor Sam Teresi earlier this month. According to the mayor, nearly $500,000 is owed to the city in past due parking tickets. The parking ticket amnesty program will allow anyone who owes money to pay the face value of the original parking ticket, without having to pay any late fees or other associated penalties. The program will begin on April 1 and continue until April 30.

The last time the city held a parking ticket amnesty program was in 2009, when it netted $116,000.

• VIEW VOTING SESSION AGENDA

Among the resolutions is a ban on the use of tobacco related products throughout all city parks, regardless of location. Current city law states that the use of tobacco is banned at ball fields, playgrounds and building facilities. The new proposal would extend the ban to all other locations of public parks.

Another resolution involves implementing a parking ticket amnesty program, which will allow anyone who owes on late parking tickets to pay only the original fine of the ticket. Mayor Sam Teresi said earlier this month the program will allow the city to recoup some of the nearly $500,000 in overdue fines that are owed to the city. If approved by the council, the amnesty program will begin April 1 and continue throughout the entire month.

Monday’s voting session begins at 7:30 p.m. and is open to the public.

JAMESTOWN – The city of Jamestown is hoping to collect past due money from residents and visitors alike.

On Monday night Jamestown Mayor Sam Teresi explained to the city council that there is more than $1,380,000 in outstanding revenue owed to the city. More than $885,000 is due unpaid fees associated with required demolitions, property maintenance, court fees, alarm responses, and other miscellaneous charges. In addition, $498,000 comes from overdue parking tickets and Teresi is hoping to recoup some of that money starting next month.

As part of his 2016 State of the City report, Teresi said he would like took into a parking ticket amnesty program, similar to one instituted by the city in 2009. Monday night the mayor offered more details on the program, adding that if the city council gives its approval, he’d like to see it initiated starting April 1 and continuing for the entire month.

Under the guidelines of the amnesty program, people with unpaid parking fines would only have to pay the face value of the original ticket, not any additional fines associated with the violation. The mayor believes this could result in a significant amount of revenue that would help the city’s 2016 budget.

The proposal is not unprecedented. The last time the city implemented such a program was in 2009, when it netted $116,000. Teresi said that year there was actually a lower amount owed in overdue tickets, meaning there’s a chance that the city could net even more money this time around.

The amnesty program will need to be approved by the Jamestown City Council before going into effect. Lawmakers will vote on the matter during the March 28 voting session. If approved, anyone who has an overdue fine will be notified of the amnesty program and will have the entire month of April to pay the initial fine.

Jamestown Mayor Sam Teresi during the March 14 Jamestown City Council Meeting.