Homewood City finance committee approves staffing referral, budget amendment and surplus listings

The Homewood City Finance Committee convened April 15 and approved a string of administrative actions, including a staffing referral, a budget amendment to upgrade Microsoft licenses and the declaration of city vehicles as surplus.

Chair called the meeting to order and the committee approved a motion to dispense with the readings and accept the April 1 minutes as distributed. The motion passed by voice vote, recorded as 4 to 0.

In new business, a council member told the committee the planning technician position had been vacant for about 18 months and that staff have absorbed extra duties. The council member moved to allow staff to pursue filling the planning technician vacancy by accessing the personnel board's candidate list; the motion was seconded and approved by voice vote (recorded as 4 to 0). The committee directed the mover to prepare the personnel-board resolution.

IT staff recommended upgrading the city's Microsoft tenant to enterprise-level licensing to gain additional security, compliance and auditing tools, including standardized multi-factor authentication and geofencing to block unexpected international logins. The staff member said the request would require an amendment to line item 0109 (99301, carryover fund balance) to increase the allocation from $66,000 to $100,000 and noted the higher annual cost will need to be budgeted in the fall. Committee members discussed ongoing budgeting for the licenses; the motion to approve the budget amendment passed by voice vote, recorded as 5 to 0.

The committee also reviewed a list of older vehicles and equipment — including a 1999 Ford F-150, a 2009 Ford F-150 and a 2013 Ram 1500 — that staff said carry too many miles and cost more to repair than to replace. Members moved to declare the listed items surplus and voted to approve that declaration by voice vote, recorded as 5 to 0. Chair said an ordinance to formally declare the surplus property will appear on next week’s agenda.

Members discussed authorizing the mayor to sign a contract with accounting firm Carr, Riggs & Ingram for interim accounting work while the finance director position is vacant. Staff explained the firm has been helping informally and the contract would formalize that support; one council member moved and another seconded authorization but the available transcript segments do not record a final vote on that motion. The chair noted the contract is budgeted but that additional funding could be addressed if needed.

The meeting concluded with no further items and the committee adjourned. The committee did not record any formal motions to table or postpone the items summarized above; where the transcript did not include a final recorded vote (the Carr, Riggs & Ingram authorization), this article reports only what appears in the available transcript.