The capital budget moves forward through the Mayor’s office. When we last checked in, the planning commission was making adjustments to the department requests. They passed along their recommendations and the Mayor has made some tweaks. From his letter:
With a few exceptions noted here, I have accepted the recommendations of the Planning Commission. The Planning Commission included $19,000 for the Fire Department to match a federal grant; the City has subsequently approved a special appropriation in the operating budget to cover this grant match, so I have deducted this from my Recommended Capital Budget. In addition, I have recommended eliminating $30,000 that the Planning Commission had recommended for Mill Hill Building Repairs, and instead, I have recommended the inclusion of $35,000 for repairs at the Lockwood Mathews Mansion. The Lockwood Mathews Mansion has not received funding from the City for several years, and the work to the windows at the
Mansion is desperately needed. Moreover, unexpended City funding is available to
the Historical Commission to pursue needed work at Mill Hill. And finally, I have
increased the recommended appropriation for the Redevelopment Agency’s Urban
Connectivity Project from $100,000 to $250,000. This project is a vital component to linking the various development projects along Norwalk’s urban corridor.
$35k is not much in the overall scheme of the budget, and I’m perplexed that $30k would be cut from repairs of the Mill Hill complex, but Mayor Moccia is suggesting that the city has funds to pay for the work in operating expenses. The council will have to vote to authorize that level of expenditures, so hopefully some council members take a hard look at that, and not let it slip through the cracks.
The total capital budget is $29,716,500 with $17,763,000 financed from grants and other non-general fund sources and $11,953,500 from the general fund.
