May 2014 Newsletter. Preparing Fiscal Year 2015 Budget

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1 May 2014 Newsletter Welcome to the City of Carlton s electronic newsletter! Life is busy, and staying up-to-date can sometimes seem impossible. We hope that you find this newsletter an easy way to stay informed about the City s latest news, projects, resources and events. Please feel free to share this with other community members. You can subscribe to this free newsletter on the Carlton website. Hard copies are also available to read at City Hall. We welcome your feedback, too. Hit the reply button and let us know what you think or send us your suggestions. Preparing Fiscal Year 2015 Budget The City is currently preparing its budget for next year. As defined by Oregon State Law, a budget is a financial plan containing estimates of revenues and expenditures for a given period such as the fiscal year. The City is required to budget all funds and for each fund must have a balanced budget. The State of Oregon defines a balanced budget as one in which total resources, including beginning reserves, current resources and debt proceeds, equal total requirements, including current year expenditures, capital outlay, transfers, debt service and other requirements such as debt service reserves. As a rule, local governments in Oregon operate on a fiscal year that begins on July 1 and ends the following June 30. Carlton s budget operates on this schedule. Budgeting is critical because it requires Carlton to evaluate plans and establish priorities in relation to available financial resources. Also under ORS, a legally adopted budget is necessary to establish and justify a given rate and/or amount of property taxes to be levied on the property within the city. Carlton s budget will accomplish each of the four major purposes of Oregon Local Budget Law including: Establish standard financial procedures. Outline programs and services in conjunction with the fiscal policy and implement those policies. Provide methods of estimating revenue, expenditures and proposed tax levies. Encourage public involvement in the budgeting process before budget adoption. Carlton prepares and adopts its annual budget in accordance with the City Charter and Oregon law. At the start of the calendar year, meetings are held with department heads, the Mayor and

2 City Council to set goals and priorities for the upcoming year. In April, a proposed budget is prepared and presented to the Budget Committee, which, by law, comprises the Mayor, City Councilors, and seven citizen members. A summary of the approved budget is published in the local newspaper. The City Council then accepts the Approved Budget from the Budget Committee and conducts a public hearing. This year s hearing is scheduled for June 9 th at 7:00 p.m. at City Hall. The Council may or may not make changes to the budget following the hearing at which time the budget is Adopted and is filed with the County Clerk and the State of Oregon. The property tax levy is certified to the County Assessor by July 15 th. Please contact Chad Olsen, City Manager, at or by (chad@ci.carlton.or.us) if you have any questions or want to know more about Carlton s budget for next year. City Elections The City Councilor positions are elected positions that serve for a four-year term. Carlton s councilors have staggered terms, so there isn t a complete turnover each election year. The Mayoral position is open every election year, and the Mayor serves a two-year term. The new terms will begin January 1, This election year the City of Carlton will have three Council positions open as well as the Mayoral position. Carlton has 1,142 registered voters. By charter, those persons wanting to have their names appear on the ballot in November 2014 must have a minimum of twenty registered voter signatures on the designated forms provided by the State. Candidates are always encouraged to get more signatures than required in the event that some are ineligible, i.e. aren t registered voters or don t live within the City of Carlton. Signatures are verified at the County, comparing them to signatures they have on file from prior elections and against registration applications. Packets will be available at City Hall beginning in July for those Carlton citizens who are interested in running for office. It is important to read all the materials carefully and fill out all portions that pertain because failure to complete the forms will prevent the City Elections Official from accepting any part of the completed packet. The deadline for turning in all the necessary paperwork to City Hall is August 19 th, One of the most misunderstood portions of our packet is the signature sheets. All signature sheets must be approved in writing by the City Elections Official before circulating. Failure to do so will result in the rejection of those signature sheets. The reason for this is the top portion of the signature sheet describes what the petition is for and must be filled in prior to circulating. The Elections Official verifies this prior to a candidate circulating the petition, so that the people signing know what they re signing and for whom.

3 There are informative manuals that the State of Oregon has available online at with examples of each type of form needed. A person wanting to run for City Council or Mayor must be 18 years of age or older, a registered voter, reside within the City of Carlton for twelve months prior to the election and have maintained primary residency during those twelve months. As always, we are here to help answer any questions you may have. Please do not hesitate to call Loreli Wright, City Recorder and Elections Officer, at Wi-Fi in the Upper Park Last year, the City of Carlton and Comcast completed a joint project to provide free Wi-Fi service in the Upper Park. The antenna is at the pool house, but the service area should include most parts of the park. This is an unsecured network open to the public, so as long as you are in range just click connect to the Public Pool Wi-Fi network and you should be on. If you experience problems, please contact City Hall at or chad@ci.carlton.or.us. Best Tasting Water Almost! The City of Carlton is a member of the American Water Works Association. A contest is held annually to determine the best tasting water within the Northwest Subsection of AWWA. This year Carlton competed against the City of Salem, Oak Lodge Water District, Joint Water Commission, McMinnville Water and Light, City of Wood Village and Hillsboro Cherry Grove Water. The winner this year was Oak Lodge Water District followed by the City of Carlton. This has been a popular contest over the years, and it gives all the entrants a chance to claim some positive fame. Carlton has won the event in the past, but this was the best showing for several years. So now every time a customer takes a drink from their tap, they can pause and appreciate that Carlton water is almost as good as it gets! If you have any questions please contact Bryan W. Burnham, Carlton s Director of Public Works, at bburnham@ci.carlton.or.us.

4 Carlton Pool House Project: General Obligation Bond As you may recall from last month s newsletter, the City is preparing a project to replace the existing dilapidated pool house structure with a new 3,664 square foot facility. To recap: The pool house is well past its useful life and needs to be replaced. A concept design study for the pool house was completed in February 2011 to replace the existing dilapidated structure with a new 3,664 square foot facility. The 2011 report received community input and is supported by the Council; however, the cost cannot be supported exclusively by the City and requires additional resources. The City contracted with Carl Sherwood to update the 2011 report to ensure the project s conceptual design, materials and estimate are current. In April 2014, Sherwood reported to the City Council that replacement of the pool house is expected to be $1.39 million. Wedbush Securities Inc., the City s financial advisor, provided multiple funding analyses for consideration. The analyses considered the City s current assessed value, projection assumptions, and rates per thousand. The City has set aside cash reserves to help fund the project, including $70,000 through fiscal year 2014 and has earmarked an additional $50,000 in fiscal year 2015 for a total of $130,000. The City Council has agreed to place a Measure proposing the sale of General Obligation Bonds (GO) on the November 2014 general election. The bond levy amount has been identified as

5 $1.32 million. This includes $1.25 million toward the construction of the new pool house and $70,000 for issuance costs of the bond. The difference between the bond amount and the pool house construction cost will be paid by the City. This is anticipated to be approximately $140,000. Please contact Chad Olsen, City Manager, at or for more information on this important project. Scam Awareness The Carlton Police Department would like to take this opportunity to provide the following information regarding scams and how to best protect you and your family. There are countless scams facilitated by phone, internet and mail, including false representation of police departments, courts, and other public and private organizations. Warning signs of these scams are that they all ask for money and/or personal information. The criminal s objective is to instill into each victim a sense of urgency, obligation or fear to provide money or personal information. The elderly are often targeted and suspects often pose as extended family members. Some victims state that they thought the suspect sounded exactly like the family member who requested the victim send money. The Carlton Police Department recently received a fraud report where a citizen received a phone call from an individual posing as a police officer with the Culver California Police Department. The suspect advised the citizen that a family member had been arrested and the citizen needed to send money so the relative could be released from jail. The suspect requested the citizen send money via a pre-paid Green Dot Money Voucher which is often untraceable. Since the suspects are often in other states or countries, it is difficult to build cases against the perpetrators. Fortunately, in this case the citizen became suspicious and contacted the Carlton Police Department. Due to the instinctive nature of victims to be good hearted and trusting of what appear to be legitimate organizations, they often provide money and/or personal information. Some of these scams include requests to make payments to the IRS, medical claims, an injured family member, or an arrested family member. Remember, if someone calls you and requests a payment for something or asks for your or someone else s personal information, do not provide it before talking to other family members to verifying the authenticity of the request. The following are key rules to remember when receiving a request for money or personal information: 1. Never give personal information of any kind via any form of social media, phone or internet. 2. Never provide money or any form of payment to someone that has contacted you prior to conducting follow-up with legitimate sources to ensure the authenticity of the request (Family members, legitimate organizations and local law enforcement).

6 If you have any questions about potential scams, call your local law enforcement or visit the Department of Justice website to learn more about how to report possible crimes and what additional things that can be done to protect yourself. Oregon Department of Justice Scam Alert Network and Consumer Complaint websites: Park Rules and Regulations The City of Carlton takes pride in its parks and many residents and visitors take advantage of these facilities. Occasionally, there are conflicts and this is a good opportunity to review park rules and regulations. Carlton Municipal Code; Rules and Regulations All city parks have been designated for recreational use consistent with ORS For the conduct of persons using or frequenting the public parks of Carlton, Oregon the following rules and regulations to be observed and enforced within said public parks are established: A. Parks open dawn to dusk except during special occasions as authorized by order of the city council. B. Open fires are not permitted. Barbeque use is permitted in picnic areas only. C. No dogs allowed on sports field and play structure areas in Wennerberg Park. In the Upper Park dogs must be on a leash. Any person failing to clean up after their dog is subject to a five hundred dollar ($500.00) fine. D. Motor vehicles, motorcycles and trailers shall be operated on roadways at the posted speed and park in designated areas. E. All park visitors are expected to treat others in a polite and respectful manner at all times. Any park visitor using abusive or profane language may be expelled from the Carlton park system. F. Any person participating in any act of vandalism to any city park plants, trees, rocks, soil or structures or other city property will be subject to a minimum fine of five hundred dollars ($500.00). G. All waste material shall be properly disposed of in the provided receptacles or hauled away by the park user. H. No public defecating or urinating. Restrooms are provided for your convenience. I. Permits will be required for the placement of signs or assembly of persons in the city park to which the general public is invited when it is reasonably expected that such assembly will be attended by ten (10) or more persons. J. Any form of recreation that is determined by city staff to have the potential to harm another part user is prohibited.

7 Of course, the vast majority of park users are very respectful of the parks and other patrons; however, on occasion we do receive complaints. By far, most complaints concern dogs off-leash in the Lower Park and failure by dog owners to clean up after their pets. Please remember that even though your pet can be off-leash, it still needs to be under voice command and not everyone enjoys your pet as much as you do. In fact, some people are scared of dogs. And finally, please clean up after your pets, others shouldn t have to. By adhering to the park rules and regulations, we are able to better enjoy our community parks.