(a) Generally. No money shall be drawn from the Treasury of the City, nor shall any obligation for the expenditure of money by the City be incurred by any officer, board or commission authorized to expend City money, except pursuant to an appropriation and the allotment thereof. All fees received by all City officers or employees in connection with their official duties shall be accounted for and paid into the City treasury.
(b) Budget Process. The General Fund and Coal Severance Tax budget process for the City of Bridgeport shall begin in January. At this time, each Department Director shall be requested to prepare a detailed budget request for his or her department. In this process, each line item should be analyzed to determine if the budget amount needs to be increased or decreased from the previous year’s budget. A number of factors must be considered when this is done including inflation, increase or decrease in the work force, utility rate increases as well as new requests.
(1) By the second council meeting in March, proposed balanced budgets for the General Fund and the Coal Severance Tax Fund shall be presented to City Council and formally acted upon. The budgets shall be put in the proper format for submission to the WV State Auditor’s Office.
(2) The Water, Sewer and Cemetery fund budgets shall be prepared after the completion of the General Fund budget process. The same prudence will be necessary in the preparation of these budgets; however, the same time constraints will not be in effect. These budgets shall be prepared by their Department Directors and given to the Finance Director for compilation. Balanced budgets shall be approved by the appropriate governing body.
(c) Budget Revisions. There are two types of budget revisions used by the City of Bridgeport.
(1) Internal Budget Revisions. These revisions shall be prepared when funds are transferred between accounts within the same department. They shall be requested by the Department Director and approved by the Director of Finance and the City Manager. When final approval is received, the revision shall be posted to the accounts and the Department Director shall be notified. These revisions should not be used for new purchases. The City Manager shall have the power and authority to make line item revisions within departments in the General budget and line item revisions in the Water Fund budget, the Sewer Fund budget and the Cemetery budget. This authority shall extend only to line item revisions within departments and within funds and shall not be construed to delegate authority to transfer items from one department to another or to budget additional revenues or contingency funds.
(2) Formal Budget Revisions. These revisions shall be necessary when additional funds are needed. The funds shall be taken from Contingency, additional revenues, or reduced expenditures in other departments. These revisions shall require City Council and W.V. State Auditor’s Office approval. Requests shall be given to the City Manager who will forward them to the Finance Department for compilation. The revision shall be approved by City Council, and then forwarded to the WV State Auditor’s Office. When their approval is received, the revision shall be posted and the Department Director shall be notified. These funds shall not be spent or encumbered until final WV State Auditor’s Office approval is received.
(d) Contracts for Expenditures. No office, department, board, commission or other agency of the City shall during any fiscal year expend, or contract to expend, any money or incur any liability, or enter into any contract for any purpose in excess of the amounts appropriated or allotted; and no such payment shall be made nor any obligation or liability incurred unless the Director or Finance shall first certify that unencumbered or unappropriated funds for the designated purpose are available by signing an approved purchase order. This approved purchase order shall be obtained prior to the signing of any contract. Any contract, verbal or written made in violation of this section shall be null and void, and if any officer, agent or employee of the City shall knowingly or willfully violate this provision, such action may be cause for his or her removal from office. Nothing in this section shall prevent the making of contracts or leases providing for the payment of funds at a time beyond the fiscal year in which such contracts are made if the funds have been previously appropriated, provided, that the nature of such transactions conforms to the Constitution of the State, the Charter of the City and the general law of the State.
The City Manager shall negotiate and enter into all contracts upon behalf of the City, except as otherwise provided in the Charter or by ordinance. Such contracts to be negotiated and entered into by the Manager shall be within the limits of the budget, as determined by the purpose and subject matters of the contracts. If any such contract involves the expenditure of more than five thousand dollars ($5,000), or the performance thereof extends beyond the budget year, or involves the expenditure of money not within the budget, such contract shall be ratified by Council. However, in any event, all contracts entered into must comply with federal, state and city regulations. The Manager shall report in writing to Council any negotiations and the terms of the contract requiring their ratification, and the Council may in such cases alter, amend, ratify or reject any such contract. Any contract executed by the Manager on behalf of the City in violation of the terms of this section shall not be binding upon the City.
(e) Capital Reserve Fund. The following policies will be utilized in the future to administer these funds.
(1) Monies budgeted from General, Water or Sewer Funds shall only be transferred to the Capital Reserve Fund when funding for the project is going to be escrowed for more than one year.
(2) If, at any time, it is determined that there are excess monies in the General, Water or Sewer Fund Transfer to Capital Reserve accounts in excess of what is needed to complete the project, only the amount required will be transferred to the Capital Reserve Fund. The balance of these funds shall remain in the appropriate line items, and can only be utilized with further appropriation from Council.
(3) When a project is completed in the Capital Reserve Fund, any remaining balances in project budgets or contingencies shall be transferred at the end of the fiscal year back to the appropriate account in the General, Water or Sewer Funds which will increase their fund balance. These funds may be re-appropriated by the governing body at a future time.
(f) Rainy Day Fund. The Rainy Day Fund may receive appropriations, gifts, and grants from any other funds made available. This account may be funded over a period of years up to the maximum level of thirty percent (30%) of the City’s operating budget. These funds may be used to cover the General Fund’s short falls; and any other purpose the governing body considers appropriate. It is the goal of City Council to set aside a minimum of ten percent (10%) of the General Fund, fund balance each year into this account and a minimum of twenty-five percent (25%) of Business and Occupation tax on construction on any federal or state contract or any construction project with a value of over one million dollars.
(g) Banking, Investment and Purchasing Procedures. Due to the changing nature of banking and investments, a Finance Committee is hereby established and shall consist of the Mayor, City Manager and the Director of Finance. This committee shall have the sole authority to select banking and other financial institutions to provide services relating to the management of the City’s resources in accordance with the Short and Long Term Investment Policies previously established by the Finance Committee. The committee is also responsible for establishing purchasing and bidding procedures and to establish and amend the Financial Policies and Procedures Manual.
(Ord. 04-06. Passed 9-11-06.)