I’ve had two basic questions regarding the recent conversations at Tampa City Council surrounding the budget for Tampa Fire Rescue (TFR) and their Capitol Improvement Projects. The first was just wanting to understand what a “reimbursement resolution” was and why it was needed now and what about the $20 million in the fiscal year 2024 (FY24) budget.

A reimbursement resolution is simply a declaration to the IRS that you intend to bond a certain amount of money for a certain project or projects over a set period of time. And once you’ve made that declaration, you can then spend money out of pocket on those projects until you issue the bond, then reimburse yourself. That’s it. It doesn’t actually commit you to borrowing, it simply gives you the ability to do so without borrowing the money up front.

The last one passed by Tampa City Council was in October of 2022 for $80 million with about a dozen projects on it. Station 24 and the Fleet maintenance & supply move were on the list. The 5 year CIP plan is $116 million and includes Stations 6, 9 and 10. Clearly there is a need for another reimbursement resolution. (About $78M of the $80M has been accounted for.)

As to my second question about the money already allocated in the FY24 budget—I reviewed the final budget hearing. It was clear in the “revised” budget presented by the admin based on Council feedback that the $20 million in TFR CIP for FY24 was to be bonded. There is $664,000 in FY24 budget for debt services related to those items. When Council approved the budget, including the CIP, they approved bonding those projects. (Among other items including the Land Trust and anything else in the CIP that references “Non Ad Bonds CIP Fund Series 2023”.)

A vote to issue the bond is still required. However approving the budget and CIP is a commitment and unless they find money in the couch cushions issuing the bond should be as much as a procedural step as the reimbursement resolution. The hard decision is approving the budget.

Unfortunately to this point, I do not think that has registered with this City Council. There is still confusion as to when they “approved” bonding something. I warned after the last budget process that this would come up. That Council would shift blame away from themselves onto the admin. It would be my desire for this to be the last year that happens. I hope with the addition of the budget analyst and lessons learned this year they will begin to understand.

I also think a lot of this could have been avoided if the reimbursement resolution was passed as a part of or immediately after the adoption of the budget. Stretching it out until December, spread over the holidays while delaying a broader conversation about bonding created unnecessary confusion.

Additionally, I think if certain members of Council hadn’t tried to grandstand about “getting something done” and turned the reimbursement resolution into a political football this wouldn’t have been delayed. Hopefully a lesson was learned.

I certainly would have loved for someone on City Council to have been able to answer my question a month ago. I kind of expect my Council members to be able to answer these questions.