By James Rincon

Pflag Reporter

The city of Pflugerville is scheduling a Sept. 14 public hearing to receive citizen input on the Fiscal Year 2011 budget.

At the Aug. 24 City Council meeting Mayor Jeff Coleman said the only remaining questions concerning next year’s budget are whether it will fund Parks and Recreation improvement projects and whether it will reserve funds for an additional police officer and an animal control officer.

On the recommendation of Councilman Victor Gonzales, Council approved a motion instructing City Manager Brandon Wade to include the police and animal control positions in the budget, after Wade removed them from earlier Performa. Council members indicated they would revisit the feasibility of the additions in December when more precise city revenue projections are available.

“I would be in favor of certainly putting these two positions in the budget… [contingent upon] evaluating the need for those two positions at that point. What I’m saying is, let’s put them in, and if the revenue is not there, there’s not much we can do in terms of staffing those positions,” Gonzales said.

The city’s gross underestimate of the cost of a regional detention pond, earlier this year, is part of the reason why the positions were initially removed from the 2011 budget.

“This year was a pretty tight budget year. One of the things that impacted us pretty hard was this regional detention basin project. That still isn’t actually formally resolved, but because of the financial obligations we had with that project, we are actually going to have to postpone several other capital projects we planned on doing,” Cooper said Tuesday. “When Brandon [Wade] had gone through the budgeting process there were several things he did to cut our expenses. Our expenses were outpacing our revenues, so a couple of those things were to just not provide additional positions in some of the departments.”

Cooper said the 2011 budget will have to cover the potential $6-16 million difference between the city’s projected cost of the pond and the actual cost.

The other unresolved issue in the budget is park-improvement funding.

Pflugerville resident Melody Ryan addressed the Council at last week’s meeting beseeching consideration of her prioritized list of park development projects in the 2011 budget. She said she has incorporated feedback for the Parks and Recreation Department in her plan, as well as input from the Pflugerville Council of Neighborhood Associations and other citizens.

“One of the reasons we paid fifty-something-thousand dollars to have a park master plan prepared was to prioritize improvements within the parks system in the city. Could I please ask, so that we don’t study things to death and throw our $50,000 out the window, that we look at the priorities that the entire city pulled together in the plan before we take one person’s perspective.” Cooper said to council members at the meeting.

Ryan said she has considered the content of the city’s master plan, but the plan is too nonspecific regarding parks improvements to certain tracts of undeveloped land.

“This is more detailed than would be appropriate in a master plan,” Ryan said.

Councilman Darelle White agreed with Ryan that a more detailed plan for parks improvement would benefit the city. Ryan said she will to make a formal presentation of her park priorities at the next City Council meeting.

The 2011 budget does not currently include any capital improvements for the Parks and Rec. Department.

Council won’t approve the Department’s master plan until after it approves the 2011 budget Cooper said. The plan will have a list of improvement priorities, though not necessarily a list of detailed capital improvement projects.

The latest version of the city’s FY 2011 budget can be downloaded at cityofpflugerville.com/index.aspx?nid=34.

The city will announce the details for the Sept. 14 public hearing on its website within the next two weeks.

jrincon@pflugervillepflag.com