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EXTRA $4 MILLION
Lathrop general fund surplus swells to $11.8M
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Back in June the City of Lathrop was sitting on around $7.8 million in general fund reserves.

And now, as they’re getting closer to the mid-year point in their bi-annual budget, the city is looking even healthier financially than previously expected – coming in with an additional $4 million in surplus funds to expand the general fund surplus to $11.8 million due to higher than expected property and sales tax revenue and lower expenditures due to salary savings from key positions not filled within the city’s hierarchy.

Earlier this week the Lathrop City Council approved a request by staff to take that general fund surplus and spread it out across a variety of funds, including:

*$500,000 to the Capital Equipment Replacement account to replenish depleted reserves.

*$2.5 million to Street Repair reserves to maintain deteriorating city roads.

*$1 million to the Retirement Stabilization reserves to set aside funds for future retirement unfunded liability.

And the city will be making a number of personnel changes and reclassifications to meet the demands of the city’s existing and growing workload:

*One senior planner position will be reclassified as a principal planner due to the complexity of the agency’s development projects.

*The Assistant Community Development Director position will be unfunded with the retirement of the Community Development Director, and the promotion of the existing ACDD to that position.

*The vacant legal assistant position will be eliminated now that the administrative assistant has assumed the duties of the department’s administrative tasks in the wake of the legal secretary’s retirement.

The proposal approved by the council will also add positions that will allow the city to be more efficient in handling the inquiries and the workload that comes as a result of development – which Lathrop is seeing more of now than at any point in the last decade.

Both a building inspector and a construction inspector position will be added to the existing budget to allow the city to more efficiently handle the existing workload of both public and private construction projects, and a new administrative assistant position is being added to the public works department to provide administrative support for ongoing projects.

To contact reporter Jason Campbell email jcampbell@mantecabulletin.com or call 209.249.3544.