FORTVILLE — Officials have to come up with a $227,000 payment for Vernon Township’s new fire station after inheriting a budget that did not account for the expense.
The $4.25 million station in Fortville is expected to be finished this month.
Amanda Fronek, who’s been the Vernon Township Trustee’s office deputy since the beginning of the year, said at a township board meeting last month that the station’s first $227,000 bond payment is due in January 2020. When preparing the 2019 budget last year, the township’s previous administration did not set a levy that would have secured funds ahead of the bond payment’s due date, Fronek explained.
Vernon Township won’t get its first tax payment of 2020 until June of that year, five months after the station’s first bond payment is due.
Fronek said the township is working with a financial adviser on finding enough money in this year’s budget to make the payment. She said much of the solution will depend on how much the township will get for properties it has for sale at 726 W. Broadway and 104 N. Main St. in Fortville. Bids are due May 20. Highest bid and best use will make up the township’s standard when determining to whom to sell the properties.
Florence May, who began her term as Vernon Township trustee in January, told the Daily Reporter that making the debt payment will likely require cuts to this year’s budget.
“We’re going to have some short-term pain because of this, but big-picture I think there’s nothing catastrophic here,” May said.
May’s predecessor, Jim Nolte, told the Daily Reporter that he thought his administration left the incoming one with adequate means to begin taking on the new fire station’s bond debt.
“I’m not sure why there are any complications,” Nolte said. “All of the financials were approved by the board.”
Current Vernon Township Board members Marybeth Sears and Gary Sharrett also served on the board last year, as did Andrew Smith, whom Nancy Cushman replaced starting in 2019.
Sharrett told the Daily Reporter he did not know why a levy for the bond payment was never established in 2019’s budget. Sears, who did not attend April’s board meeting, could not be reached for comment, nor could Smith.
Fronek said at last month’s board meeting that the bond payment is just one of multiple “triage problems” the current administration inherited. She credited her colleagues for putting in the extra work required to resolve the setbacks.
Sharrett said he’s thankful for those efforts and that he and the other board members serving in the past were unaware of the brewing issues.
“There were things we didn’t know,” Sharrett said.
Cushman expressed her gratitude to the township staff as well.
“We appreciate everything you’re doing, because you got handed a mess,” she said.
