HomeMy WebLinkAboutBudget Committee Minutes 4-11-22
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BUDGET COMMITTEE
Meeting Minutes - April 11, 2022
Committee present: Eric Levine Pam Bleiwas, Rod Howe
Staff present: Donna Shaw, Judy Drake, Debby Kelley, Marty Mosely, Joe Slater, Dan Thaete
Meeting was called to order at 12:02 p.m.
AGENDA ITEMS:
• Review and approve meeting minutes from March 21, 2022.
Moved: Pam Bleiwas Second: Rod Howe Motion Passed
• Review and approve creating an investment account with NYCLASS.
The committee discussed materials received regarding New York Cooperative Liquid Assets
Securities System (NYCLASS). NYCLASS is a local government investment pool that allows
municipalities to pool funds to collectively earn interest on investments. Investment holdings are
collateralized as required by New York State General Municipal Law. Deposits are liquid and
participants may move money on any business day. There is never a penalty for withdrawals.
Accounts can be set up to parallel our own internal funds. Interest rates tend to be better than our
local banks due to professional investment expertise provided by Public Trust and economies of
scale relative to purchasing power of the pooled funds. It is believed that the Village of Cayuga
Heights currently participates in the fund and will be contacted for feedback based on their
experience.
The Committee was in favor of moving this investment option to the Town Board for consideration.
Our investment policy would probably need to be amended.
• Discuss implementation of automatic payments for water and sewer bills.
Staff have received numerous requests from customers in the past for automatic payments of their
water and sewer bills. Williamson doesn’t have the capability to accomplish this. After a
conversation with the Trust Company, it was determined that we could handle this through our
Treasury Management ACH processing. This would require setting up an ACH template much like
we payroll direct deposits, only opposite, with the Town account being credited and customer
accounts being debited. Customers would need to sign an authorization form that includes bank
information and contact details. This would require a fair amount of administrative work to get set
up but should be manageable to maintain (especially considering there would be less check
payments to process). The Committee discussed contacting customers if their quarterly bill was
significantly higher than normal before initiating the ACH.
• Discuss utilizing consolidated account codes for final budget.
Sample budget information was shared with Committee regarding consolidating account codes for final
budget adoption. This is an effort to limit the amount of budget amendments required by giving
Managers the flexibility to move budget amounts within there .100 and .400 accounts. It was explained
that we would still maintain the account detail currently used in our accounting system. We would also
continue to provide this detail for the tentative and preliminary budgets. However, when it was time
to adopt and publish the final budget, we would eliminate the detail.
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• Other Items.
There was some discussion regarding upcoming changes to the open meeting law and whether
committee meetings could continue virtually.
It was also reported that Fiscal Advisors has advised that there would not be any savings realized
by refunding the 2015 water bond. We would still pay off the road improvement portion of that
bond later this year.
The meeting was adjourned at 12:30 p.m.
Next Meeting: Monday, May 9, 2022 at 12:00 p.m., Town Hall - Aurora Room or Zoom