City reallocates $750,000 for fiscal year 2025

More than a year ago, in a Boulder City Council discussion about budgeting, Mayor Joe Hardy, in two sentences, summed up the most basic truth about city budgets.

“If we budget it, we don’t have to spend it if the money is not there. But if we do not budget it, we can’t spend it even if the money is there.”

While that is the basic truth, unexpected expenses still come up. For most cities, they would just declare the budget to be in deficit and move on. But Boulder City can’t —per its charter —run a deficit. So at the end of a budget year, sometimes things need to get moved around.

That happened early this month as the city council voted (as part of its consent agenda) to make changes to the budget for the fiscal year that had just ended in order to plug about $750,000 in unbudgeted expenses. Per a city report, the police budget was over its operating budget for fiscal year 2025 by $480,000, all of which was for salaries and benefits.

“It was caused by an additional police officer on the payroll that was not included in the original budget and new trending from holiday payouts and the last labor negotiations that added education stipends,” reported Finance Director Cynthia Sneed in an email to the Review.

The fire budget was over by $170,000, including $100,000 for vehicle maintenance and $70,000 for overtime. Finally, the municipal court budget is expected to go over its current operating budget for fiscal year 2025 by $100,000, largely for costs relating to court-appointed attorneys, which is the result of an unfunded mandate in state legislation.

So where does the money come from?

According to Sneed, $380,000 will come from savings related to an in-process rewrite of the municipal code.

“The municipal code rewrite is a labor- and time-intensive project,” Sneed said. “The savings were from the part of the project that was budgeted for but not completed in FY 25. The project is included in the FY 26 budget and is moving forward.”

The second largest chunk of $150,000 comes from the city’s human resources department from a position that was funded in the budget but was vacant for much of the year. Another $150,000 was also related to vacancies.

“The deputy city manager position was vacant all of FY 25,” Sneed explained. “There were salary savings in the community development department when the community development director was acting city manager and was being paid from the city manager department. The city manager position is already filled and recruitment for the deputy city manager is currently underway.”

So all of that adds up to $680,000. The final chunk of $70,000 comes from money that was budgeted for city costs for the last election relating to the ballot question covering additional spending for the city pool.

“The unused budget was funding that was budgeted in case there was need for a special election or if additional ballot questions were requested,” said City Clerk Tami McKay.