CITY TRASH PICKUP COST MAY GO UP; COUNCIL GETS STAFF REPORTS ON RETREAT WITH CITY OFFICIALS

Cape Girardeau residents could face higher garbage collection fees while city employees would get slightly higher than usual raises if the City Council goes along with the recommendations of the city staff.

The raises would bring city employees' salaries closer to parity with comparable cities in Missouri, city officials said. But the increases would come at the expense of replacing some of the city's aging equipment because city revenue is not increasing like officials predicted.

The council met for seven hours Friday at Black Forest Village north of town to discuss the budget and the general direction the city should take next fiscal year. The council holds its annual retreat every April to hear reports from department heads and hold discussions, but saves its decision-making for regular meetings.

John Richbourg, the city finance director, spent most of the afternoon outlining the shape of the budget that will govern city spending from July through June 1998.

He said he shaped his proposal based on earlier decisions made by the council to "adjust the city pay plan to make it more comparable to averages of St. Joseph, Jefferson City, Joplin and Sedalia," and to "maintain city services at the current level."

City Manager Michael Miller said those cities are about the same size as Cape Girardeau and have similar city services.

Richbourg said the average for the four comparable cities was more than 4 percent more than Cape Girardeau city employees make. He recommended cutting that gap by one-third in the next budget with salary increases of 4.2 to 6.2 percent.

Miller said he expects the other cities to raise their employees' salaries so Cape Girardeau's increases would only close the gap slightly.

"We've had a lot of persistent comments from employees about the pay scale," said Councilman J.J. Williamson in an interview. "The City Council in September made a recommendation to the city manager to find a way to bring the salary range, maybe not up to par, but generally closer."

"Retention is one of the issues," said Mayor Al Spradling III in an interview. "With police and some fireman, we're losing them to other cities and to higher paying jobs."

But the city doesn't have enough money to make up the difference, Richbourg said. "Sales tax revenue has come in at half-a-million dollars less than budget," he said. The budget is about $15 million.

The first few months of 1997 brought lower sales tax receipts than the same months of last year, Richbourg said.

Miller said cities across the state report similar trends.

The city usually takes in substantially more than it needs for operating expenses and uses the difference for capital expenses like replacing worn-out equipment.

For 1998, Richbourg recommended forgoing $1.4 million in those expenses that department heads requested. For example, the Public Works Department requested two new dump trucks at $52,500 each to replace a 1975 and a 1976 model truck. Their replacements will have to wait one more year, Richbourg said.

In addition, he said, the solid-waste revenues fell well short of projections. The transfer station, where city employees compact trash from garbage trucks and ship it to a landfill, processed 40 percent less trash than the year before. This meant a revenue loss of $100,000, Richbourg said.

In addition, the city took in $40,000 less than it projected from the sale of stickers for extra trash bags because residents have reduced the volume of trash they throw out, he said. Add a reduction of $20,000 in revenue from recycling and the city refuse collection program is $160,000 less than projected.

With this shortfall, Richbourg recommended a 5 percent increase in refuse collection fees for next fiscal year. That would amount to about 60 cents over the $12.13 residents now pay.