ONTARIO — Ontario’s permanent appropriations for 2025 include major investments in water and sewer infrastructure.
The city is planning a looping and replacement project for waterlines along Lexington-Springmill Road and other areas of the city, for which appropriations passed Wednesday budget $945,000.
Mayor Kris Knapp said he expects about $440,000 to come back to the city from an Ohio Public Works Commission waterline grant for the Lexington-Springmill Road waterline project.
“This $945,000 has to be in our budget so that project can go out to bid, but we will get some of that back from the grant,” he said.
Council members unanimously passed the 2025 permanent appropriations budget, ringing in at $21,344,304, on Wednesday.
The largest single-line appropriations are $1,957,000 for payments to the City of Mansfield for wastewater treatment, $1.9 million for police salaries and $1.8 million for self insurance claims.
The permanent budget is about $200,000 more than the temporary budget passed in December, with minor increases in park maintenance funds, insurance costs and the police canine program.
Finance committee chair Dave Rehfeldt said most line items didn’t change from the temporary budget.
“We had two budget meetings in the past two weeks understanding where the numbers came in at,” he said.
“I also wanted to talk about revenue, because we need to make sure our cash flow is in line with what we’re spending.
“The city has increased revenue approximately $8 million over the last six years. So we’ve done a fairly good job at looking at revenue versus expenditures.”
Budges for capital improvements this year include three police cruisers, a bucket truck, plow truck and municipal building and technology improvements.
City revenue estimates are usually finalized in the summer.
“The revenue budget I have this year is about $19.5 billion,” Rehfeldt said. “There’s a $2 million difference there, but most of that is in water and sewer.
“We’ve been building that fund for projects like this, so we’re right in line with where we need to be.”
A city well also requires repairs for about $72,000.
“Those wells bring the water from the ground and fill our tower,” Knapp said. “That’s an unexpected cost we didn’t anticipate, but we need to maintain those to make sure we don’t have this big a bill every year.”
Compared to the 2025 temporary budget, the budget for police overtime decreased 31% to $90,000 instead of $131,000. Following city council agreeing to four sergeants and 14 officers and the promotion of a new sergeant, Police Chief Tommy Hill said the additional supervisor should cut down on overtime costs.
Council members also got to explore the BearCat SWAT vehicle Wednesday, bought in partnership with the county and cities of Mansfield and Shelby. Ontario committed about $50,000 to the armored vehicle in 2023.
The BearCat will be deployed for tactical teams to and from hostile situations and to assist with recovery and protection of civilians in situations such as terrorist threats or hostage negotiations.
