Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutFIN-09-105 - Interim Financial Statement as of June 30 2009 REPORT REPORT TO: Councillor B. Vrbanovic, Chair, and Members of the Finance and Corporate Services Committee DATE OF MEETING: August 10, 2009 SUBMITTED BY: Dan Chapman, General Manager of Financial Services and City Treasurer PREPARED BY: Roger LeBrun, Manager of Financial Planning WARD(S) INVOLVED: All DATE OF REPORT: August 5, 2009 REPORT NO.: FIN-09-105 SUBJECT: INTERIM FINANCIAL STATEMENTS AS OF JUNE 30, 2009 RECOMMENDATION: For information BACKGROUND: These interim financial statements for the six months ended June 30, 2009 are provided to update Council on City expenditures and revenues compared to the 2009 budget and to explain significant variances. The report includes schedules for Municipal Enterprises as well as supplementary information related to investment income and tax arrears. This is the first of three such reports for 2009, with the next reports scheduled for September and December results. REPORT: Deficit Mitigation On May 5, 2009, staff identified the potential financial impact the economic downturn may have on the Corporation of the City of Kitchener. Some of the components that were anticipated to negatively impact the City’s financial results in 2009 included reduced investment income, below-target supplementary tax revenue and higher tax write offs and rebates. In addition, the City forecast increased winter control costs as a result of significant activity in the first part of 2009. Of these factors, reduced investment income is anticipated to be the single largest source of negative variance. While the true extent of the deficit for 2009 will not be identified until year end, it is estimated that it will exceed the deficit experienced in 2008. In order to mitigate the effects of this potential deficit, immediate action was taken to address this situation in 2009 as follows: ïë ó ï The Senior Leadership Team implemented a series of temporary policies which are intended as guidelines for decision-making in day-to-day work with the goal of reducing expenses. They cover areas of controllable spending including staff training and conferences, meeting and meal expenses, memberships and subscriptions, overtime and on-call, advertising, publicity, promotions and printing. A review of existing capital projects was undertaken to identify the potential to close out unexpended capital balances. Normally these funds would be transferred to the capital pool to fund new capital projects through the annual budget cycle. Staff is commencing the development of a long-term financial plan which will position the City to respond to the budgetary challenges highlighted by current economic conditions. The impact of these policies is being monitored on an ongoing basis by the City’s Corporate Management Team and Senior Leadership Team on a monthly basis to ensure that the corporation is achieving appropriate savings in these areas. The projected cost savings to date of these efforts are summarized in the table below and amount to approximately $644,000 (includes both tax-based and enterprise budgets). Expense TypeGrand Total Advertising$45,200 Conferences/Seminars/Training$133,830 Consulting Fees$15,200 Labour/Overtime$290,332 Maintenance$24,555 Meeting Expenses$4,210 Memberships & Subscriptions$3,260 Miscellaneous$4,540 Partnerships$14,232 Research & Marketing$26,000 Service Level Adjustments$10,000 Staff Resources$45,000 Supplies$27,300 Grand Total$643,659 rdth and 4, 2009, an extensive review of existing Capital account balances for each On June 3 department was undertaken as part of a budget control initiative. Each department provided recommendations for closeouts and options to postpone capital projects or fund them differently. Departments were able to achieve approximately $9.6 M in capital closeouts through this process, representing 17% of the total unexpended capital balance. Approximately $3.2M of closeouts was transferred to the tax based operating fund to help mitigate the operating deficit. A detailed breakdown of the $9.6 M in closeouts is attached in Appendix A with a summary of closeouts by funding source shown below: ïë ó î TOTAL FUNDING SOURCECLOSEOUTS Capital out of Current (CC)3,246,420 Development Charges1,243,736 Water Enterprise1,117,819 3,699,199 Sewer Enterprise Reserves244,698 Grand Total9,551,871 Operating Fund – City (Schedule 1) The report includes an asterisk to highlight budget areas with year-to-date variances in excess of 10% and $50,000. Staff has analyzed these variances and, unless noted in the projected year-end column, the year-to-date amount results from timing differences between actual activity and budget calendarization. The actual revenue and expenditures for the six months ended June 30, 2009 have not been adjusted for timing differences, such as unrecorded liabilities, and therefore should be viewed with that in mind. The projected year-end deficit is $513,000 which equates to a negative variance of 0.4% on a $127,000,000 annual operating budget. The deficit would be approximately $4,389,000 before taking into account the deficit mitigation initiatives implemented in the first six months of the year (described in the previous section). Some of the key variances projected to the end of the year are as follows: Operations - it is estimated that the Operations division will be over budget by $560,000. The primary causes pertain to winter maintenance, increased CVOR training and increased fleet charges. The negative variance has been partially offset by a planned reduction in overtime costs where applicable as part of the deficit mitigation plan. DTS Planning/Engineering recoveries – The lower number of site plans and subdivision applications YTD will likely lead to a shortfall in recoveries and site plan fees of approximately $380,000. Community Programs & Services – the delayed opening of the Williamsburg Community Centre will provide a savings of approximately $85,000. An additional savings of $115,000 should materialize as a result of deficit mitigation initiatives as well as reduced staffing costs where appropriate. Fleet parts – an increase in the cost and use of parts within the Fleet budget has exceeded budget by approximately $175,000. Staff attempt to provide the most realistic estimates based on the information that is known at the time of preparing the year-end projection, however there are some areas with significant budgets that are difficult to predict at this time. This uncertainty has the potential to alter the projections significantly and these areas will continue to be monitored closely. These include the following: Supplementary taxes and tax rebates/refunds/reductions – with a net budget of $1.5M, much of the supplementary billings and rebates/refunds/reductions occur very late in the year once information has been processed by MPAC. It is estimated that rebates/refunds/reductions will increase this year due to the recent reassessment and current economic conditions, and supplementary taxes will be lower than budget. The ïë ó í combined impact is an estimated negative variance of at least $1,500,000. In 2008, there was a negative variance of $1,203,000 for this budget line. Investment income – staff has calculated the annual budget for investment income based on a 5 year history on both rate and average balance. In recent years, the rate had contributed to substantial increases in investment income over budget. With recent market corrections and adjustments of over 220 basis points, investment income is not expected to return the same surplus as in previous years and is only expected at this point achieve 34% of last year’s returns. These factors give rise to a negative variance of over $1,300,000. Gapping – the annual budget for gapping is $2,300,000 and there is a year to date negative variance of $217,000. This figure is difficult to predict due to the variable nature of staff changes. The projected deficit of $513,000 will be closely monitored for the remainder of the year. As more refined projections are developed, staff will be able to assess the need for further action and mitigation efforts and will update Council as part of the next interim report. Building Enterprise (Schedule 2) For the six months ended June 30, 2009 the net deficit in the Building enterprise was $0.4 M. A significant contributing factor to this deficit is that building permit revenues are 32% lower than the level experienced in 2008 YTD. Any net deficit from the operating fund will be funded by the Building Enterprise Reserve Fund. Golf Courses (Schedules 3 and 4) Doon Valley and Rockway Golf Courses are $82,000 below budgeted net revenue year to date, primarily due to poor weather conditions for the golf season year to date. In addition, the economic conditions have negatively affected the number of rounds played as well as the number of memberships sold. A question was asked at Audit Committee on June 29, 2009 regarding the issues that gave rise to the opening accumulated deficit at Rockway Golf Club. In 1996, there was an upgrade made to the clubhouse along with other capital expenditures for approximately $900,000. This expense was financed through a 10-year debenture which was budgeted for in the Rockway operating budget projections. During that time period, the National Golf Course Owners Association approached the City of Kitchener regarding a “level playing field” with the golf course dividends that were being paid to the City. The conclusion of that process was that the dividend payment to the City would be increased to be the equivalent to municipal taxes and income taxes for the golf course operation which took place as of 2002. This increased financial pressure had a negative impact on Rockway due to the debenture payments that were being incurred on their operation and resulted in an accumulated deficit. Projections for the golf course on budget day indicated that Rockway would be in a surplus position by 2011. Water Utility and Sanitary Sewer Utility (Schedules 5 and 6) The Water Utility, prior to consideration of capital closeouts, fell short of budget projections by approximately $243,000, primarily due to significant rainfall experienced in the summer which resulted in lower water sales. The water utility identified $1.1M in capital closeouts which has resulted in a favourable variance of approximately $857,000. ïë ó ì The Sanitary Sewer Utility, prior to consideration of capital closeouts, fell short of budget projections by approximately $1,840,000 and is attributed to the following: The water consumption forecast was not achieved during the year YTD, which reduced surcharge revenue in the Sanitary Sewer Utility; and Increased inflow and infiltration due to high precipitation levels which led to an increase in the cost of sewage processing from the Region of Waterloo. The Sanitary Sewer utility received $3.7M in closeouts. The impact of these transfers has resulted in sewer realizing a YTD surplus of approximately $994,000 as of June 30. Gas Utility (Schedule 7) The Delivery Operations and Other Programs are trending as expected relative to budget as of 1 May 31, 2009. Expenses in the Contact Centre are higher than budget due to the need for more part time dispatchers than what was considered in the budget. The Supply Company revenues are higher than budget due to increased consumption in combination with an increased retail rate than originally budgeted for in the latter 2 months. Expenses as a percentage of revenue are higher than budget since gas from inventory at a higher value was used to supply the increase in consumption. Investment Report (Schedule 8) Investment income is expected to have a negative variance for 2009 of approximately $1,300,000 due to market rates having fallen significantly as well as a lower overall short term investment balances. Rates are expected to remain flat-lined for the remainder of 2009. Taxes Receivable (Schedule 9) Taxes receivable of $98.6 M at June 30, 2009 was $2.9 M higher than at the same time in 2008. Taxes due from previous years billings increased by $1.25 M. FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS: Financial implications are discussed above and detailed in the attached schedules. All amounts are unaudited and may be subject to adjustment through the audit process. COMMUNICATIONS: N/A ACKNOWLEDGED BY: Dan Chapman (General Manager of Financial Services and City Treasurer) 1 one month timing delay necessary to establish accurate actual results ïë ó ë ïë ó ê ïë ó é ïë ó è ïë ó ç ïë ó ïð ïë ó ïï ïë ó ïî ïë ó ïí ïë ó ïì ïë ó ïë ïë ó ïê ïë ó ïé ïë ó ïè ïë ó ïç