2025 Troy City Budget Primer
The City Budget will be rolled out to City Council's Finance Committee on Monday
This coming Monday at 5:15 p.m., in the basement of the city building, City Council’s Finance Committee, along with other council members, will get their first look at the 2025 Budget for the City of Troy. Since the meeting will be held in the building’s basement, the meeting will not be recorded, which is really unfortunate for our citizens; the city budget is the most important piece of legislation that the Council will adopt this year, which is the framework for the city spending $61.5 Million in the next year.
The presentation of the budget to the Finance Committee will be made by the City’s Top Bureaucrat, who signs off on the budget before it is submitted to the committee. One of the first slides in the presentation, will be the one below that gives a high-level view of the city’s finances for the next five years.
The two charts below show the five-year financial projections from both the 2025 budget (top) and the 2024 budget (below). Before there is a deep discussion of what the 2025 budget entails, it might be helpful to compare these two charts to determine the fiscal health of the community.
The first thing that jumps out is that in the bottom chart, the city was expected to begin 2025 with $34.59 million as a beginning balance (bottom chart, top row, second column from the left). However, in the 2025 projection (top chart), the city will actually being the next year with $52.5 million — a healthy difference of around $18 million.
There was next to no discussion about the source of this $18 million windfall in the city treasury in the Top Bureaucrat’s memo to the Finance Committee, introducing the budget. It does appear that the city has received north of $11 million in grant funding for the dam removal project, but it still leaves some room for discussion about the other millions of dollars that aren’t accounted for between the two charts.
A Quick Glance at 2025 Capital Improvements
In the 2024 chart, the city planned to expend $5 million in capital improvements, that number balloons to $25.4 million in 2025. It leaves open the question of what it is in the city’s capital budget to expend those dollars. While this publication won’t go into every detail of the capital expenditures in the 2025 budget, there is plenty of room for discussion of what the largest planned expenses are.
Over $19.5 million in capital improvements are planned in Fund 441- Capital Improvement Fund. $12.1 Million is planned for the Dam Removal Project which includes the following aspects:
Levee Toe - $4.364 Million
Oxbow Connection - $2.4 Million
Low Head Dam Removal - $1.6 Million
Crawford Street Recreational Trail - $1.531 Million
Recreational Trail for South Side of River - $1.2 Million
River Park Plaza - $1.0 Million
In many ways, it’s curious how an original project to remove the dam and connect the former channel of the Great Miami River, at a cost of $4.0 Million, has now turned into a $12 Million project that includes a $1.5 Million Recreational Trail for Crawford Street that truly isn’t wanted by the neighbors and honestly won’t be used by cyclists.
Earlier this year, the City failed to get grant funding for this project. Now, the city administration seems poised to move ahead with the project, regardless of grant funding. The question remains, why is the devoting precious resources to such a superfluous and unnecessary project?
The City is also planning to expend $5.0 Million in capital improvements on the downtown square; these are the improvements that were the subject of a number of public meetings earlier this year and a final design has not been completed. This publication talked about this project multiple times, the latest being in September.
Some other notable capital improvements in 2025 include spending $1.418 Million for the new roundabout at Adams Street/Riverside Drive/Staunton Road.
Fund 228, the Parks and Recreation Capital Improvement Fund is showing a $1.2 Million expenditure for the design and build of a new Park Maintenance Building and $1.7 Million for repair and renovation of the Troy Aquatic Park.
The final capital improvements of note come from the city’s water capital improvement fund. $1.0 Million is allocated for new downtown waterlines and valves, as part of the $5.0 Million downtown project outlined above, along with $1.5 Million for a waterline extension to Casstown.
Other Notes
In the 2024 budget projections, street paving was allocated to receive $1.5 Million for each year of the projection. In 2025, that projection was increased to $1.7 Million (with $1.8 Million in 2026). This could be in part to higher costs due to inflation, but also the 2025 budget memo stated a desire to begin an alley paving program.
The 2024 projections showed that $5.0 Million would have been allocated for capital improvements for future years, however, the 2025 project increased that amount to $7.0 Million per year. If those figures are to remain true, some tough decisions will need to be made due to the fact that the city’s own capital improvement plan shows that at least $10 Million in capital improvements needed in 2026, 2027 and 2028.
Also of note, in 2024, the end balance of 2028 was expected to be $15.28 Million, the 2025 projection puts that figure at $22.0 Million, a considerable increase of 43%.
Explaining a complex document like an entire $61.5 Million budget in a concise and understandable format is no easy task, especially for a publication like this. Future editions will help try to dive into the budget and provide more and deeper context. But if this interests you, our readers would be well advised to attend Monday’s meeting at 5:15 p.m. in the basement of the city building to learn more about the city budget and hear the budget presentation for yourself.
What Do You Think?
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