09 - Increase in City's monthyly health insurance contribution

Home Browse Search

employees (unrealistic), we will keep all employees we hire (less realistic), and that we will fill a majority of the currently vacant positions by January 1St (a possibility, but still unlikely). What these assumptions do in essence is provide me a very conservative expense that I need to keep in the budget. In all likelihood, these assumptions will be wrong and there will be more money available that goes unspent due to continuing vacancy. However, given we are just now starting the new Fiscal Year, I have chosen to err on the side of extreme caution. We can always revisit this later in the FY (perhaps halfway) and see if there is more room to maneuver. We do however have to bear in mind that other operational expenses could go up unexpectedly, so we have to allow for some room to work within in order to perform our required tasks for the community. We typically rely upon some room from our salary lines to help us meet the unexpected needs of the community that we did not budget for, however this is an issue that I believe warrants tapping some of those funds while we will have to balance the unexpected expenses in the future. Therefore, if I look at the estimated savings from those positions we will likely not fill by January 1, 2023, we easily will have $120k+ available to help with our contribution increase. Adding $30/month/employee for January — September (3/4 of FY) is estimated to be between $85k - $95k added to the budget. Therefore, my conservative estimates show us comfortably handling this $30/month/employee increase. I would like to offer more to the employees, but this increase represents a new fixed amount added to not only the FY22/23 budget, but all future budgets unless we were to take it away. Therefore, I would recommend we either wait until mid -way through FY22/23 to determine if we can add more, or the FY23/24 budget process in order to make sure we can balance revenue with this added expense. The easiest time to make these determinations is when the entire budget is open for review, which only effectively occurs at the budget process. OPTIONS: 1. Approve the increase in the City of Paris' monthly health insurance contribution by $30/month/employee from $565.00/month/employee to $595.00/month/employee, to take effect January 1, 2023. 2. Reject the proposed increase, request a different amount, and/or request more information. RECOMMENDATION: 1. Approve the increase in the City of Paris' monthly health insurance contribution by $30/month/employee from $565.00/month/employee to $595.00/month/employee, to take effect January 1, 2023.