Complete Document - City of Auburn

Budget Message (continued) May 28, 2002project on Wire Road. Town Creek Park will also be constructed during FY 03. It willprovide a passive setting for those people that are interested in relaxing in a beautifulsetting, permanently reserved as public space. Adjoining Town Creek Park will be themajor new cemetery that also will be constructed during this next fiscal year.For the past two years, we have been planning to build a tennis center with claycourts with annual memberships as the basis for the debt service payments. During thisperiod, we have had donated to the City property for the site on Richland Road near ShugJordan Parkway and we have hired a landscape architect to design the facility.Construction on the project will begin when the tennis center has approximately 350members committed to pay the $400 per year membership fee. The Tennis Center will bea project of the Public Parks and Recreation Authority and will be funded with revenuebonds that will be amortized by the membership fees paid by the members. Non-memberswill be welcome to play for a daily court fee. We estimate that the tennis center will costapproximately $1 million.We also have plans over the next two years to renovate the Boykin CommunityCenter and the Frank Brown Recreation Center with Community Development Block Grantfunds. Both facilities will be given facelifts so that they are to the same standard as ourother facilities. The Boykin Center is fifty years old and the Frank Brown Center is nearlythirty years old, so it is time both of them were modernized. Also, in the budget are fundsprovided through CDBG for the construction of a teen center as part of an expansion to theFrank Brown Center. The architect envisions the Teen Center wrapping around the presentbuilding that will serve as a new façade for the Center and will allow use of the gymnasiumby the teens using the teen center.Commercial Development- You rated commercial development as your fourthhighest priority this year. Councilwoman Carolyn Mathews wrote on her priority rankingsheet this year: “…the City’s ability to fund all we expect and want is dependent on a strongtax base. If retail leaves Auburn, not only will the City not be able to fund many of theseprojects, but we will not be able to continue the additional funding given to our schoolswhich is the citizens’ first priority.” Carolyn’s analysis of the economic situation is exactlycorrect. Over forty percent of the City’s revenue comes from sales taxes. Property taxes,business licenses, and occupational license fees on commercial properties provide anadditional large share of the City’s overall revenue. Residential development withoutaccompanying commercial development will create a serious funding problem for the Citygovernment in future years.As long as the tax situation remains as it is in Alabama, the City will continue toderive its revenue from the business-based taxes. Therefore, just as we have been activein the creation of an industrial base over the years, we have to continue to be active in therecruitment and development of a commercial base. I think the pattern of development thatwill be established over the next several years will provide a commercial anchor for the nexttwo decades; so it will be important for the City to be alert to new commercial developmentopportunities that will locate in our area.Other Key Recommendations- We have included in the budget a proposal torelocate the Water and Sewer Department offices and storage yards to a site at theterminus of Samford Avenue on Shug Jordan Parkway. The property is owned by theIndustrial Development Board and is located behind the EMS station in Industrial Park #1.28