MANSFIELD — Alomar Davenport said he was “very nervous” about the city’s final 2022 appropriations budget City Council approved Tuesday night.
“It’s no fault of the administration. It’s no fault of the (department) budgets,” said Davenport, 4th Ward representative and chair of council’s budget committee.
“It’s simply where we are going in terms of gas prices, in terms of inflation, in terms of …. and those things cannot be budgeted in October,” said Davenport, midway through his first term and who took over the budget committee in January.
Davenport also made it clear he’s prepared to use federal American Rescue Plan Act funds to cover operating needs in the city during the year if allowable under the rules of the plan.
Council unanimously approved the plan, which includes $32.6 million in general fund spending. But Davenport lamented the fact it’s a bare-bones budget with little capital spending.
It also doesn’t include additional payroll spending that may be required due to AFSCME Local 3088 exercising the “me too” clause in its contract after the city awarded 7.75 percent pay increases to police union members.
Davenport was the only member of City Council to address the budget on Tuesday evening before the vote.
“I have spoken about my fear for the codes and permits with their inability to hire an architect. The IT department I am fearful for, because as (IT Director James Weiner) spoke about earlier, he has no capital and his whole department is run on capital,” Davenport said.
“Maintenance, because you cannot see the things that come in maintenance. Of course, safety will always be a concern. They can never have enough money. There are a lot of concerns that come with this particular budget,” he said.
Davenport said the fact the city will receive another $10.4 million in American Rescue Plan Act federal funding provides him with “solace and cautious optimism.”
“Our current budget is not a true depiction or a true reflection of what our financial situation will be in 2022, because it does not take into account the $10 million that we will receive from ARPA in June or July or whenever it’s supposed to come,” he said.
“The hope is that some of that money will be able to be placed into those departments where we have concerns, so to where they can continue to run throughout the year,” Davenport said.
He said he is certain city Engineer Bob Bianchi would like to spend ARPA money on more infrastructure improvements, such as the city did with an emergency storm water sewer repair near Bowman Street in 2021 and a planned storm water sewer replacement along Third Street in 2022.
Council in 2021 approved $2.1 million for the two-phased storm water project that will run from the Bowman Street area all the way to Touby’s Run.
Legislators also approved spending $900,000 in ARPA funds for engineering and design work to replace about 25 miles of aging city water lines in various locations, creating “shovel-ready” projects the city can use to seek additional state and federal funding in the future.
Davenport, however, said such big-ticket items in 2022 may not be possible if greater day-to-day needs arise.
“It would not allow us to do some of the other things that we are going to need to do with that money,” Davenport said. “So, as I say, there is cautious optimism for our financial perspective for 2022.
“I do wanna give kudos to the finance director and administration for putting together this very tight budget and and doing what they could do best, like prioritize some of the things that we do think need to be prioritized.
“We could always use more money. We simply don’t have it. It’s an extremely tight budget. But like I said, it is not a true reflection of what our financial outlook will be for this year,” he said.
