Findlay's income tax collections lagging

FINDLAY — Deficit spending by the city of Findlay in 2025 may be worse than projected. On Tuesday, Auditor Jim Staschiak presented the mid-year budget review to Findlay City Council's Appropriation Committee. Mid-year budget reviews were first established by a resolution of council in 2008, as a means to check in on the city's financial health and prepare for budget talks for the following year. The full report is available on the auditor's page of the city's website: www.findlayohio.gov. As of mid-year, Staschiak said income tax collections for Findlay are about $1.8 million below the city's projections. Should that trend continue, the city's spending could outpace its revenue by $5 million to $8 million by year's end. During the review, Staschiak again encouraged council to be more proactive in the city's economic development to boost income tax collections to meet the city's operational needs. "The city of Findlay has a standing Strategic Planning Committee with the opportunity to create a city-wide, long-term view of what types of businesses should be recruited," he said. "It also needs to focus on contingency planning. A proper plan needs to include all three legs of the stool for the city's government: financial, capital and directional." In the 2021 mid-year budget review, Staschiak said warehouses made up 45% of the mapped acreage for Findlay's industry, manufacturing and warehousing, but account for a very small amount of revenue to the city. He said manufacturing is the largest income producer for the city, and it also creates greater "linkages," or networking between businesses, and "employment multipliers," or impact on other employment opportunities in the community. He underscored the problem to council again during Tuesday's review. Findlay's approved budget shows city spending outpacing revenue by $5.8 million in 2025 and $7.6 million in 2026, with the city's year-end cash balance dropping to about $17 million by the end of 2025. The city's minimum reserve balance for 2025 is $10.4 million. Findlay routinely adopts deficit budgets, and then city departments work throughout the year to keep spending under budget. However, Staschiak has called it "the largest two-year deficit proposed since the Great Recession" and an indicator that the city's budget is no longer sustainable. Wage concessions and the end of the "huge windfalls" in business taxes are driving the deficits, he has said. On Tuesday, council approved $397,405 in de-appropriations from the city's budget to stem the deficit spending. That's $40,000 more than was reported in Tuesday's edition of The Courier due to a discrepancy on council's meeting agenda. Most of the money, a total of $251,000, is being returned from the Findlay Police Department's budget, including: $200,000 for salaries, $40,000 for software, $6,000 for cellular service and $5,000 for radios. Other de-appropriations are being made from computer services, Findlay Municipal Court and the Findlay Fire Department. In December, Muryn said her administration will de-appropriate unspent funds throughout the year and return the money to the general fund. City departments typically return about 8% of the budget at the end of the year. The de-appropriations are meant to assure council that the city can overcome projected budget deficits this year and next. In May, Findlay Mayor Christina Muryn returned about $709,000 in de-appropriated funds from the city's operating budget for the first quarter of 2025. Council rushed through legislation de-appropriating the money at its regular meeting on May 7. Most of the de-appropriated money, a total of $600,000, had been budgeted for the city's prisoner and jail expenses. The money was set aside as the city braced for the closing of the Hancock County jail, an idea touted by the Hancock County Board of Commissioners late last year that was later abandoned. Closing the jail would have more than doubled the city's expenses for the incarceration of inmates.