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x. Lastly, the City's workforce is also moving demographically towards a situation where most employees either have a long tenure with the City and will stay until retirement (most have ten years or less) or only stay a few years before moving on for better salaries, benefits, and/or work environment. The lack of a middle cadre of employees with the institutional knowledge, experience, and commitment to replace our current long -term employees jeopardizes the City's future ability to meet its core missions of protecting the community's health, safety, and welfare by providing efficient and effective services for citizens and a safe workplace for its employees. Failure to make regular adjustments to the pay scale to account for higher costs of living compounds over time and places the City at an ever increasing competitive disadvantage to recruit and retain top talent from the labor pool. Having competitive salaries, benefits, staffing structures, equipment, and work environment will be critical to developing this group of future leaders. Considering that a $0.01 increase in the tax rate amounts to a grand total of $6.86 more in the annual taxes paid by the average residential property, it becomes clear that taxes will have to be raised a substantial amount very quickly or a large amount of debt issued in order to pay for catastrophic failures in equipment, facilities, or staffing. Thoughtful and deliberate consideration should be given by the City Council, together with city staff, to the development and commitment to a tax and debt strategy to meet these future demands. City government is the form of government that has the widest ranging impact on the daily lives of our citizens. Meeting the fundamental health, safety, and welfare needs of our citizens is essential to a progressive and successful community and as presented, this budget will ensure the safety of our citizens, enhance their quality of life while providing an environment for successful economic development. I appreciate the efforts of staff during the preparation of the proposed budget under another year of difficult fiscal circumstances. In addition, I wish to extend my thanks to the City Council and Council's willingness to take the time to understand each department's operations. Such understanding provides context and background to better understand the budget and also enlightens staff's understanding of Council's priorities.