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MARQUETTE -- The Marquette City Commission held a special meeting Tuesday to discuss the city's budget for the upcoming year.
The nearly six-hour meeting began with a discussion of the Marquette City General Fund for the 2024 fiscal year, which makes up the city's day-to-day funding, including police and fire departments as well as the general government operation.
The 2024 fiscal year general fund budget comes from the city's revenues, which total $25,195,730. The majority of that money comes from tax revenue, which equals $12,406,400. Other sources of revenue include more than $3.5 million from state shared revenue and more than $2 million in grant money.
The upcoming year's budget will see an increase over the 2023 budget, thanks to an increased millage rate, which the city approved in June 2022 and saw the city's tax rate go up by 2.6731 mills.
Marquette City Manager Karen Kovacs told the commission that the increased millage rate contributed roughly $487,000 of an increase to the upcoming year's budget.
The city's general fund budget aims to mitigate the city's expenditures, which the city says will be slightly over the total budget, coming in at $25,804,610, which represents a more than $600,000 deficit in the city's general fund.
The majority of the expenditures in the city's 2024 budget comes from wages, which tally at more than $8.6 million. Other big costs come from pension contributions, supplies and services as well as payroll taxes.
"Our people are what drive our daily operations. They are what make the magic happen," Kovacs said. "They are the ones that are out there all of the time, doing the work, and it's important that we are investing in our people."
After a discussion of the general fund, the meeting then turned to the city's long-term outlook.
According to the city's projections, the general fund will continue operating at a deficit for the next few years, but the city estimates that 2028 will be the first year where that budget drops significantly, thanks to many of the city's current projects, such as brownfield projects, beginning to take in revenue as opposed to being a budgetary negative.
"We do see a turnaround. We do see a light at the end of the tunnel. Because of the things we have done in the past years. Because of the hard decisions that you have had to make. Some of those sacrifices we have considered," Kovacs said. "Those small incremental changes that we have made on the operational side, really allow us to keep going."
Randy Crouch can be reached at 906-228-2500 ext. 542. His email address is rcrouch@miningjournal.net.