City Council Cuts $2 Million, Upgrades Fire Hydrants, and Urges Citizens to Complete 2020 Census

21/4/2020

What happened:
The City Council approved several motions

Directing City Manager Randy Smith to work on a contract with HDR Engineering Inc. for the annual beach survey;
Requiring developers to build sidewalks whenever they are required to build streets;
Discussing negative publicity due to extremely low census participation numbers;
Approving a budget of $50,000 from the excess reserves to use towards enhancing fire hydrants, and most important;
Accepting the proposed $2 million of budget cuts due to COVID-19.

Why it matters:
According to Planning Director Aaron Hanley, "When a developer is required to install a street in a subdivision, it makes sense for it to be a trigger to put in a sidewalk."

Mayor McNulty and Council members urged residents to complete census. "We need to inform the residents of how important it is to fill this out, because it sets up our demographics for the next ten years, which is funding, not just for us, but for Cameron County as a whole," emphasized the mayor.

Despite the $2 million-dollar budget cuts, Council members all agreed to pass a motion to "approve a budget enhancement for $50,000 from excess reserves to be allocated towards stage enhancement fire hydrants."

"I think with the budget meeting, we're trying to cut back, but you can't cut back when it's the safety of the community. It's absolutely necessary," stressed Councilwoman Alita Bagley.

If you're interested:
According to Darla Lapeyre, our EDC director, the importance of the census comes down to raw dollars. "$16,000 per person over ten years. That's $16,000 a person of funding (for our island) at the local, state, and federal level."

Click Here to Fill Out Census