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On Monday, June 22, Mayor Joe Pitts chaired the Clarksville City Council meeting to consider the third, first reading of the FY2027 budget. SUBMITTED <\/p>\nOn Monday, June 22, Mayor Joe Pitts chaired the Clarksville City Council meeting to consider the third, first reading of the FY2027 budget. SUBMITTED <\/p>\n
On Monday, June 22, the Clarksville City Council met in its third Special Session to consider the FY2027 budget, turning down a plan that would have increased the property tax from 92-cents to $1.03, per $100 of assessed value.<\/p>\n
A few of the city\u2019s councilmen offered amendments in efforts to continue bringing down the initial proposed 31-cent property tax increase.<\/p>\n
An amendment by Councilman Stacey Streetman reinstated monies removed at a previous meeting from both the police and fire departments.<\/p>\n
Streetman\u2019s amendment to restore transit funding was also approved.<\/p>\n
The body turned down an amendment by Councilman Ambar Marquis to cut funding of the Mason Rudolph Golf Course capital project. The failed amendment included a plan for the city to turn the golf course\u2019s management over to a private company.<\/p>\n
A Marquis amendment to cut funds to the Swan Lake Golf Course was not approved. <\/p>\n
Marquis\u2019 motion to return funding to the Ajax Turner Senior Center and prevent the city\u2019s Parks and Recreation Department from operating the entity also failed.<\/p>\n
Councilman Keri Lovato said it would be a \u201cmajor mistake\u201d for the council to move the funding back to the senior center\u2019s nonprofit group and named the multiple allegations of financial problems the center has faced in recent years. \u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was stated in an earlier meeting to give the money back and place [the center] on a personal improvement plan,\u201d Lovato said. \u201cThey have been on a personal improvement plan for three years and it has not worked.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councilman Brian Zacharias said the council needs to fund the senior center transition, bringing it under a department that is accountable.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe point isn\u2019t whether the [mismanagement] allegations are true,\u201d Zacharias said. \u201cThe point is we built a system where we can\u2019t find out\u2026We\u2019re not bystanders. We\u2019re not innocent. We\u2019re complicit in what\u2019s going on over there. The allegations of mismanagement are severe.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councilman Eric Claunch said he would prefer the senior center\u2019s board continue with the operations.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy can\u2019t we establish a committee and a new board to come up with parameters that are talked about monthly in here?\u201d Claunch asked. \u201cI will be the first one to say, if that\u2019s not met, then take it over.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Marquis amendment to transfer funding back to the senior center failed, 4-9. The councilmen who favored the action were Marquis, Claunch, Tim Chandler and Wanda Smith.<\/p>\n
Monday\u2019s meeting began with a proposed budget that included a property tax rate of $1.01. Instead of decreasing that number, it was raised by two cents to $1.03 before the final vote of the evening.<\/p>\n
A last-minute effort by Councilman Wanda Smith to decrease the proposed property tax rate down to 95-cents failed.<\/p>\n
The first reading of the ordinance to adopt the FY2027 budget failed with a 6-7 vote.<\/p>\n
The votes in favor came from Mayor Joe Pitts and Councilmen Brian Zacharias, Carlos Peters, Tim Chandler, Travis Holleman and Stacey Streetman.<\/p>\n
Those opposed were Eric Claunch, Ambar Marquis, Wanda Smith, Jerry Haywood, Jimmy Brown, Joe Shakeenab and Keri Lovato.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Monday, June 22, Mayor Joe Pitts chaired the Clarksville City Council meeting to consider the third, first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225856,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[128,130,129],"class_list":["post-225855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225855"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225855\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}