Niles Settles on Balanced Budget For 2013-14

After Niles trustees sat down with the village's finance director, Scot Neukirch, and interim village manager, Steve Vinezeano, and department heads Tuesday evening to discuss a draft of the village's fiscal year 2014 budget, they emerged with a balanced budget that contributes its surplus to the village's pension fund.

"Overall, this is a very good budget. Everybody wants (money for) something, and they've done a fantastic job balancing everything," said Mike Shields, a resident who has a business and finance background and served on the village's 2030 Comprehensive Plan Committee. 

Trustee Joe LoVerde also expressed satisfaction with the budget, saying, "I'm very pleased with it, especially that we managed to include over $1 million in additional contributions to the pension fund."

A copy of the draft budget can be viewed here. 

The budget process started last December, with department heads requesting annual budget monies. Staff trimmed about $7 million from those requests and prepared the draft budget.

At the two budget workshops held so far, the second of which was March 19, trustees gave formal input on the draft budget. Some budget items were changed because staff got more accurate estimates of costs, said Neukirch. Village trustees asked questions and tweaked some budget items.

"The budget is balanced, with the planned use of surplus to be contributed to the pension," said Neukirch. "Therefore, there is a draw down of reserves of $1.2 million that is being given to the pensions, but the budget is otherwise balanced."

Another budget hearing is scheduled for April to hear resident comments. The board must then approve the budget and pass an appropriations ordinance by May, according to Neukirch.  

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