Council explores moving street-maintenance salaries out of dedicated fund to free contractor dollars

Staff told council they are working to remove personnel costs from the street maintenance fund to make it a purer maintenance account and allow more contractor work. The change would shift salaries into the general fund while charging maintenance work to the street fund via work orders.

"Moving those salaries from the street maintenance fund, that's adding more of a burden on the general fund," staff said, outlining that six positions can be transferred now and more work remains to balance the fund. Council members pressed for specifics about how the roughly $1.4 million in personnel would be absorbed and whether core services would be affected.

Staff said the plan is to track city-crew work through the work-order system so only maintenance activity stays in the street fund; council asked for follow-up budget detail and implementation timing. The discussion ended with staff confirming further work is necessary to finalize transfers and to avoid cuts elsewhere in the budget.