Written by At this point, the city of Marion has proposed three budgets for 2026–with another one being proposed in Finance Committee at tonight’s meeting.
There has been a lot of talk about cuts and fee increases, given the city’s present status of fiscal distress, but has the budget really been reduced compared to 2025 as has been stated?
As you can see, at least when it comes to the city’s operational fund, the General Fund, budgeted expenses for actually increase by just over $558,000, assuming this latest version of the 2026 budget is passed by council.
The latest version actually increases expenditures by $1 million over the third version of the 2026 budget that was proposed. It was that third version that was passed by council on New Year’s Day as a first quarter funding bill–council appropriated 25% of that total amount.
The first version was introduced in Finance Committee back on November 17th, but it was subsequently revised to reflect budget cuts suggested by the Auditor of State after the city declared fiscal distress.
However, as you can see, when the city said that it trimmed $5 million off the budget, that trimming was based on the inflated first version of the 2026 budget–not the 2025 budget. In reality, it cut just under $442,000 from the 2025 budget in its third version of the 2026 budget.
But now, with version number four, those savings are lost. 2026’s General Fund budget is now higher than 2025’s.
And where is that extra million going, you ask?
It’s being transferred out, along with an additional $430,000, to the sanitary sewer improvement fund.
At least the money is going to something worthwhile like sewer improvement.
I’ll be breaking posting the numbers for the other funds shortly. Suffice it to say, there’s more room for cuts with many of those.