3.
Council Work Session
- Meeting Date:
- 11/04/2019
- TITLE
- Public Safety Levy
- Department:
- City Hall Administration
Presentation:
Yes
PROBLEM/ISSUE STATEMENT
The presentation will pick up from where we left off on October 7th. We covered the presentation through the immediate needs. We will recap and begin the 5 year anticipated needs. The attached power point slide deck includes 4 new slides at the end of the presentation.
On March 11, 2019, the City Council unanimously adopted the 2019/2020 Priorities identifying the need to improve the safety of Billings as our highest priority. On August 26th the Council answered the following questions during a Council work session.
The enclosed power point slide deck has been updated from the October 7th presentation. It includes data analyses of law enforcement, prosecution, code enforcement, municipal court, fire department and 911 dispatch services . The data shows the significant increase in demands for services as the community has grown over the past decades. The following topics are covered in the presentation:
The City has a structural imbalance in its City’s General Fund/Public Safety Fund. General Fund (GF) and Public Safety (PS) fund revenues combined have increased at a rate of 2.6% per year over the past decade. While operating expenses have increased at a rate of 4.0% over the same time. This has created a funding gap that is not sustainable.
Tax revenue, over the past 10 years, increased 2.3% annually. Tax revenue currently makes up 53% of the total revenue in the GF/PS funds at approx. $30 million annually. The cost to run the Police, Fire, and 9-1-1 is approximately $47 million annually. This means that the amount of money paid in GF/PS property taxes is not sufficient to cover our PD & FD budgets. The other services that are funded within the GF must rely upon other revenue sources to cover their costs. The Parks Department, Municipal Court, Administration, Mayor & Council, and Legal Departments must all rely upon other types of funding in order to operate. The other main funding source is State Entitlement Share. These are taxes collected by the State, mainly from gaming and alcohol sales, and redistributed to local governments. The City receives approximately $15 million annually that is distributed to the GF/PS funds. Combined with the property tax revenues this still creates a funding shortfall of approximately $2 million for our Public Safety needs, and puts a strain on all other services provided by the General Fund as other revenue sources are significantly lacking.
Investments to improve the safety of Billings
The enclosed power point slide deck also addresses the direction given by the Council during their August 26 Work Session. The slides cover the immediate needs, phased in over five years; plus the additional needs for years 2-5; and projected needs in years 6-10. The police department, prosecution division, code enforcement division, municipal court, fire department and 911-dispatch division are each included to improve safety for the citizens of Billings.
I am also proposing that an addition 1 mill (today’s value $204K/yr costing the typical homeowner $3.25/yr) be levied annually for addiction prevention/education. Meth addiction alone is costing the City tens of millions of dollars annually in direct cost. It is also destroying lives, families and negatively affecting our economy at all levels. If the Council is willing to consider this idea, I will ask our Continuum of Care community partners to attend a future work session to discuss how investments into addiction prevention and education may be the most cost effective way to lower our long-term costs in our criminal justice system. Today - the City is spending over $30,000,000 annually to provide criminal justice services. This idea is NOT to fund addiction services but only to help fund addiction prevention education.
Billings will not thrive as the least safe city in MT! (2019 Q2 story based on FBI statistics)
ALTERNATIVES: Exclude projections anticipated between years 6–10 years. The immediate needs are too acute to risk failure by overreaching into the future. The implementation of Lean Six Sigma or a Center for Public Safety Management Analysis will improve efficiency and help us continue implementing industry best practices over the next five years. These changes will have an effect on future public safety resource needs. Based on the current tax structure, resulting from the City Charter and the State of MT tight grip on taxation, Billings will likely need to ask voters for increased investments in public safety every 5-7 years.
Re-consider creating a Public Safety District. The assessment formula’s complexity needs to account for all users of public safety services and Montana’s current tax structure.
FISCAL EFFECTS: As we refine the scope of the project, it will have a significant impact on the fiscal effects of the PSL. The enclosed power point slide deck address the estimated fiscal effects of a mill levy.
Attachments: Power point slide deck
On March 11, 2019, the City Council unanimously adopted the 2019/2020 Priorities identifying the need to improve the safety of Billings as our highest priority. On August 26th the Council answered the following questions during a Council work session.
- What is the objective of the public safety levy (PSL)?To improve the safety of Billings, the city will focus on:
- Reducing Crime – violent & property crime & code enforcement
- Saving lives and reducing property damage - through enhanced fire department services
- Improving our quality of life – continue diversion program partnerships to reduce recidivism and minimize addiction, vagrancy and homelessness.
- Reducing traffic violations
- How far into the future should the public safety levy address and what divisions should be included?
- Law enforcement, municipal courts, prosecution, 911 dispatch, fire department, and code enforcement are each included in the analysis.
- The analysis will focus on immediate needs, anticipated needs over five years and anticipated needs over ten years.
- Impacts on facilities and equipment investments will also be included.
- How should a community-working group of citizen leaders be created to help guide communications with the public?
- Mayor Cole and Council Member Ronning will work with community leaders to identify citizens to lead this charge.
The enclosed power point slide deck has been updated from the October 7th presentation. It includes data analyses of law enforcement, prosecution, code enforcement, municipal court, fire department and 911 dispatch services . The data shows the significant increase in demands for services as the community has grown over the past decades. The following topics are covered in the presentation:
- General Peer City Data
- Law Enforcement Crime Data
- Prosecution Data
- Code Enforcement Data
- Municipal Court Data
- Fire Department Data
- 911 Dispatch Data
- GF/PSF Structural Imbalance
The City has a structural imbalance in its City’s General Fund/Public Safety Fund. General Fund (GF) and Public Safety (PS) fund revenues combined have increased at a rate of 2.6% per year over the past decade. While operating expenses have increased at a rate of 4.0% over the same time. This has created a funding gap that is not sustainable.
Tax revenue, over the past 10 years, increased 2.3% annually. Tax revenue currently makes up 53% of the total revenue in the GF/PS funds at approx. $30 million annually. The cost to run the Police, Fire, and 9-1-1 is approximately $47 million annually. This means that the amount of money paid in GF/PS property taxes is not sufficient to cover our PD & FD budgets. The other services that are funded within the GF must rely upon other revenue sources to cover their costs. The Parks Department, Municipal Court, Administration, Mayor & Council, and Legal Departments must all rely upon other types of funding in order to operate. The other main funding source is State Entitlement Share. These are taxes collected by the State, mainly from gaming and alcohol sales, and redistributed to local governments. The City receives approximately $15 million annually that is distributed to the GF/PS funds. Combined with the property tax revenues this still creates a funding shortfall of approximately $2 million for our Public Safety needs, and puts a strain on all other services provided by the General Fund as other revenue sources are significantly lacking.
Investments to improve the safety of Billings
The enclosed power point slide deck also addresses the direction given by the Council during their August 26 Work Session. The slides cover the immediate needs, phased in over five years; plus the additional needs for years 2-5; and projected needs in years 6-10. The police department, prosecution division, code enforcement division, municipal court, fire department and 911-dispatch division are each included to improve safety for the citizens of Billings.
I am also proposing that an addition 1 mill (today’s value $204K/yr costing the typical homeowner $3.25/yr) be levied annually for addiction prevention/education. Meth addiction alone is costing the City tens of millions of dollars annually in direct cost. It is also destroying lives, families and negatively affecting our economy at all levels. If the Council is willing to consider this idea, I will ask our Continuum of Care community partners to attend a future work session to discuss how investments into addiction prevention and education may be the most cost effective way to lower our long-term costs in our criminal justice system. Today - the City is spending over $30,000,000 annually to provide criminal justice services. This idea is NOT to fund addiction services but only to help fund addiction prevention education.
Billings will not thrive as the least safe city in MT! (2019 Q2 story based on FBI statistics)
ALTERNATIVES: Exclude projections anticipated between years 6–10 years. The immediate needs are too acute to risk failure by overreaching into the future. The implementation of Lean Six Sigma or a Center for Public Safety Management Analysis will improve efficiency and help us continue implementing industry best practices over the next five years. These changes will have an effect on future public safety resource needs. Based on the current tax structure, resulting from the City Charter and the State of MT tight grip on taxation, Billings will likely need to ask voters for increased investments in public safety every 5-7 years.
Re-consider creating a Public Safety District. The assessment formula’s complexity needs to account for all users of public safety services and Montana’s current tax structure.
FISCAL EFFECTS: As we refine the scope of the project, it will have a significant impact on the fiscal effects of the PSL. The enclosed power point slide deck address the estimated fiscal effects of a mill levy.
Attachments: Power point slide deck
RECOMMENDATION
| Discuss options to improve the safety of Billings. The discussion will include current and anticipated needs for law enforcement, code enforcement, fire services, prosecution, 911 dispatch and municipal courts. We are working towards a public safety mill levy and/or public safety district for Council consideration in the spring of 2020. | |||||