This is a balanced budget.
This budget is intended to address the needs and priorities of the member jurisdictions within the MAG region. We hope the cities and counties will take the opportunity to review and study it and provide comments to the Executive Council regarding the priorities established. Every effort has been made to leverage and match every dollar to its maximum potential.
Each department has evaluated its budget with their various boards before Executive Council approval.
The outlook for the organization is strong. Our biggest challenge as we move forward is succession planning to replace current staff expected to retire over the next few years. Our plan is to have some transitional overlap of employees which will show a temporary increase in salary and staffing; however, it is expected that new employees who will be replacing longer-term employees will be funded at the same level as current employees. Additionally, we will be reassessing workload to ensure all staff are being utilized at equal levels, and some individual work assignments may be changed from time to time as needed.
The general fund budget concept of $0.25 per capita dues rate is continued in this year's budget, which is the same rate as established in 2005. The most recently adopted U.S. Census population numbers (2020) are used in this budget to determine General Fund assessment to a total assessment of $183,592.
MAG’s current expenses are tracking at our budgeted amounts from last year.
Total salaries this year will be $3.8M (which includes the assumptions on COLA, Merit, Insurance, Retirement, and Longevity as listed below), approximately an 20% decrease from last year's total. This decrease is mainly due to retirements as part of our succession plan. Our total revenue is about $21M, representing a decrease from last year. This decrease is due mainly to budgeting revenue in the year of expenditure.
To determine the Cost-of-Living Adjustment (COLA), we looked at three indexes. The Social Security COLA which increased 5.9%, the National CPI (Consumer Price Index) with an 8.5% increase and the Mountainland-Plains Region CPI-U (Six mountain west states' Consumer Price Index-Urban) which went up 7.9% last year. The average of the three indexes is 7.4%. The MAG policy states that the COLA will be an average of these indexes. Due to budget restraints, we propose 5% COLA and will carry the 2% over to the next year if needed.
We are proposing a 5% COLA.
The Mountainland AOG Personnel Policies and Procedures, page 22 states, "…average merit rate is dependent upon budget availability from year to year but is generally considered to be 2%." Over the last 10 years, the average merit has been 1.45%.
We are proposing a possible Merit of up to 2%.
Our insurance carrier is the Public Employees Health Plan (PEHP). The insurance premium is based on the previous year's insurance usage and PEHP has provided us the actual rates for FY21-22. The health insurance premium increase is 8.3% about $170 per month for a family policy, while the dental premium went up $1 per year above last month.
We are proposing MAG cover the 8.3% increase for insurance.
We are proposing no change in retirement this year.
We are proposing to continue the 1% Longevity as described above.
This budget emphasizes maintaining current operational service levels. If you have any questions, please contact April Sandberg, Director of Administrative Services, Michelle Carroll, Deputy Executive Director, or Andrew Jackson, Executive Director.