Midway calculates budget trouble
BY PAM BRANNON Gulf Breeze News news@gulfbreezenews.com

Midway Fire District has a balanced budget -- all the way through September 2008. But after that, if all things stay the same as they are today, the district will start going further and further into the red and will not be able to pay all the commitments already on the books.

"If we don't make some changes in the next year, the decisions we have to make won't be ones anyone wants," Midway Fire District Treasurer Clyde Broome told his board last week.

Options outlined to commissioners included cutting firefighters in 2008, or even a general across the board 5 percent decrease in salaries, with no 'built-in' raises on top of that.

A special public meeting has been called for Tuesday, July 24, to discuss options of different funding possibilities, even going to a flat tax instead of depending on property value increases each year.

The problem has developed because of two main factors -- the decrease in construction in the area leading to decreased impact fees, and the drastic sudden decrease in property value appraisals by the county property appraiser's office. Broome showed commissioners the rundown for the last 12 years of property appraisals for the Midway district. The average for the past 12 years of property value increase has been a 9.3 percent increase per year -- with years like 1994 and 1998 registering a 10.9 percent increase, as well as 2004 showing an 11percent property value increase.

But this year, July 1, the appraiser sent final figures for the fiscal year of only a 2.9 percent increase.

Since most of the funding for the Midway Fire District is based on ad valorem taxes, the decrease in property values is drastically and unexpectedly causing some quick regrouping.

"We had based our budget and took on certain responsibilities years ago because of what the consistent growth had been," Broome explained. "We did not want to take on more than was realistic for future boards to have to face. We were trying to be very responsible. Now all of a sudden some unexpected changes are hitting us, so we have to make some decisions now, before September 2008."

"Also this year the property appraiser is charging the Midway Fire District just over $58,000 for services. That is something brand new and not budgeted."

"The only agency that will not be billed that I know of is Holley-Navarre Fire, since they do not get their funding based on property values, but charge by the square footage -- so they don't use the property appraiser's office," Broome said.

If everything stays the same as it is now, in October 2008 the board will be $40,000 short of paying their bills at the end of the month. The way the funding is set up for the district, no revenue is collected in October each year. That can be 'borrowed' from November's revenues, but then each month the district would be going deeper and deeper in the red, as Broome's long term projections.

Demeter said they do not want to cut salaries.

At the fire commission meeting Treasurer Broome told the board the options to capture the money needed in 2008 if all things stay the same would include termination of two firefighters, not giving the built-in 5 percent raises to employees they receive each year, and and then cut an additional 5 percent off all salaries across the board beginning 2008-2009 fiscal year.