How the City of Amarillo is funding former City Manager Jared Miller’s separation package
Published: Sat, 08/26/23
How the City of Amarillo is funding former City Manager Jared Miller’s separation package
MyHighPlains.com
by: Mya Clark
Posted:
Updated:
AMARILLO, Texas (KAMR/KCIT)- The City of Amarillo separated with former city manager Jared Miller and must pay him over $730K.
According to Mayor Cole Stanley, the buyout won’t impact taxpayers.“None of your tax
dollars are affected,” said Stanley. “It’s your water and sewer enterprise fund that gets affected.”
In a statement released to MyHighPlains.com on Thursday Stanley said the following.
“In the Separation Agreement with Mr. Miller, there are several components that are directly related to Human Resources functions. Those items, such as the 90-day payout and various benefits, do affect the General Fund as all HR functions do for positions inside the General Fund. However, with the salary savings over time, the effect is essentially a net-zero impact on the General Fund. Also per the Separation Agreement, the severance payment was paid, as required by law, from an Enterprise Fund – in this case, the Water and Sewer fund. That fund is comprised of payments from our water customers and not related to a tax.”
-Mayor Cole Stanley
Place Two Councilmember Don Tipps said when they looked at the enterprise fund, they decided the water and sewer funds would be least impacted, even with pending projects.
“We looked at all of them, and decided where it needed to come from, which we chose drainage and sewer,” said Tipps. ” We’ll make some adjustments; we might have to have to put some off. That’s where what we’re doing in this in this budget meeting. We’re reallocating funds to look and see what’s priority where it needs to go. So, it’s not really going to affect it, just maybe push it out just a little bit.”
Assistant City Manager and Chief Financial Officer Laura Storrs explained how city service fees impact the enterprise funds.
“We have several different fees that the city charges out to users,” said Storrs. “So our water and sewer fees that are paid on the monthly water bills, those go into our water and sewer enterprise fund. So all the money that’s collected for water and sewer services is only spent on water and sewer operations and water and sewer projects in our community.”
Storrs continued, “we have a drainage user fee and so we have a drainage fee that goes into a drainage enterprise fund. So all the money that is paid on that monthly water bill that’s related to drainage stays inside a drainage fund that’s only used for drainage operations and for drainage capital projects, then we have some various user fees.”
Assistant City Manager Floyd Hartman released a statement, where he said they working to provide the best services.
“A portion of the Separation Agreement with Mr. Miller does affect the Water and Sewer Fund and will impact some future projects. Those projects will be determined by Council, but could include items such as the FY23/24 Water Extensions and Improvements and FY23/24 Wastewater Collection Sewer Extensions and Improvements. While some projects might see a slight delay, the bottom line is that we’ll continue to work hard and make every effort to provide our fellow citizens with the best service possible.”
-Assistant City Manager, Floyd Hartman
During recent budget meetings city officials discussed potential service fee increases and have made an effort to keep fees as low as possible.
“I know they’re very conscious of being good stewards of not only the taxpayer dollars, but those user fees that are coming in as well,” said Storrs. “So, I certainly want to tell citizens that we do remain conscious that things are increasing for our citizens, and we know anytime the city of Amarillo has an increase, that it does affect our citizens by all means.”
“So, we are we are conscious of that, and we are trying to keep those increases as low as possible, but still provide the services that we need to out in the city and address infrastructure issues and other things that are also very important to make sure that Amarillo is the absolute best place it can be.”
Tipps shared that although the separation package is a lot of money, council has worked hard to find a way not to impact the budget.
“We found a way that is really not going to impact the budget, it’s not going to impact their pocketbook,” said Tipps. “That’s really what we’re looking for is to protect the taxpayer stability in the organization and just continue doing what we’re doing.”