The 2017 fiscal budget is the strongest David Molgaard said he has seen since he began as city manager more than a decade ago.
"We've had a number of good budgets, but this one is right up there," he said.
It took City Council less than five minutes to pass the next year's budget on Tuesday, which outlines a $5.6 million revenue increase from business and occupation taxes, the increased city service fee and sales tax hike.
With a $94 million budget for the next fiscal year, the city is anticipating a nearly 23-percent increase in user fee revenues, or an additional $1.25 million.
The total $6.7 million generated from the user fee goes toward street projects and police services.
The half-cent sales tax increase to help fund police and fire pensions will generate another $2.6 million. That increase left enough money in the current general fund for the city set aside in a pending account as it waits for the results from a compensation assessment.
While last year's budget included a 4-percent across the board raise for city employees, Molgaard said the city hired Virginia-based Management Advisory Group International to lead that assessment in September.
The city paid the firm $43,000 to complete the assessment, which included giving non-uniformed employees questionnaires to understand what their positions entailed, benchmarking those positions with comparable cities and then making recommendations with regard to salaries and pay ranges amid current market conditions, Molgaard said.
Once the assessment's recommendations are finalized, the city will amend the FY 2017 budget and allocate the $1.9 million in its pending account to the appropriate departments.
"When pay ranges aren't broad enough, people rise to the top of the pay scale, with no where to go except for applying for another position internally or leaving our employment for [somewhere else] that pays market rates," Molgaard said.
The city also is projecting more than $45 million in B&O taxes in FY 2017 - a 2.5-percent increase from last year. City Finance Director Joe Estep said B&O taxes, which are collected from gross revenues on a quarterly basis, comprise nearly half of the entire budget.
Utilities such as electric, natural gas and water companies pay the highest B&O tax rates, between 3 and 4 percent, Estep said.
The city also is paying nearly $240,000 less into its Public Employees Retirement System due to a lower required contribution rate.
The retirement system's board specifies annually how much the city must contribute to its retirement fund for non-uniformed employees, Estep said. That rate, which was 14.5 percent this year, was lowered to 12 percent for fiscal 2017.
Mayor Danny Jones said the bolstered budget is the result of good planning by city officials.
"We feel like an oasis of financial tranquility," he said.
Also on Monday, City Council's Planning Committee unanimously approved a pending bill that proposes to change the city's ordinance to allow blade signs downtown and West Side.
The signs would not be allowed to exceed 3 feet in width and 2 feet in height, and may not be "internally illuminated," according to the bill.
They would be allowed to project over a public right-of-way, as long as they're between 9 and 12 feet above the ground.
The bill now goes before City Council for a final vote.
Reach Elaina Sauber at elaina.sauber@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-3051 or follow @ElainaSauber on Twitter.