Edmonds City Council: Shortfall Expands Dramatically for 2013 Budget

Updated at 2:30 p.m. Dec. 11 with comment from finance director Shawn Hunstock:

The Edmonds City Council is expected to approve the 2013 proposed budget and discuss changes to it tonight at 6 during its regularly scheduled weekly meeting.

Members will discuss a list of changes to the proposed budget that is being recommended by Mayor Dave Earling, Council President Strom Peterson, Councilmember Diane Buckshnis and Finance Director Shawn Hunstock.

For fiscal year 2013, revenue is reported at $66.4 million and expenditures at $78.7 million.

Does that mean a $12 million shortfall, much more than previously projected?

"Technically, yes," Hunstock told Edmonds Patch. "A big contributor to that relates to the utility bonds we issued the last week of December last year. Because that money came in and we hadn’t spent any of it, it is sitting in fund balance now. Some of that is being spent in 2012, but a large portion is being spent in 2013 and later.

"For the General Fund, revenues equal expenses. In the Special Revenue Funds, like the REET funds and the Street fund, expenses exceed revenue by about $700,000 in total. That decrease primarily relates to spending on capital projects and a planned decline in fund balance based on projects that are in the City’s Capital Improvement Plan.

"And as I mentioned above, we are intentionally spending down fund balance in the utility funds because we have the bond proceeds that came in late 2011 that we are still spending, on top of new projects that are planned for 2013 in the utility funds."

The council will then break into committee meetings: finance; parks, planning and public works; and public safety and personnel.