Mayor plans to tap EDIT funds

It turns out the mayor didn’t need a quarter of a million dollars after all.

Mayor John Boggs announced at the Portland City Council meeting Monday that he plans to fund the newly unveiled Small Business Resilience Grant with money from the city’s economic development income tax (EDIT) fund, bypassing council approval of the grant program, for now.

The city also received its long-awaited wage study, which compared city employees’ salaries to those in similar positions in eight other cities in the area.

Boggs originally planned to ask council to appropriate $250,000 from its rainy day fund toward the grant. Announced last week through an executive order by the mayor, the grant makes any business that deals with consumers in the city’s taxing district eligible for a grant of up to $1,250 for losses sustained during the COVID-19 pandemic but not covered by the paycheck protection program (PPP) established by the federal CARES Act.

Applications for the grant, which Boggs said will be available within the next week, will go to the city’s EDIT advisory committee for review. It will then be subject for ultimate approval at a future city council meeting.

The EDIT fund is more appropriate for the grant than the rainy day fund, city clerk-treasurer Lori Phillips said.

It is also more bountiful — the EDIT fund currently has $798,944 available while the rainy day fund sits at around $488,000, she said.

Phillips and council members agreed that the rainy day fund should only be used in emergency situations, which could happen at any time because of the economic ramifications of the coronavirus pandemic.

Council member Janet Powers also recommended that businesses that receive potential grant money be required to submit W-9 income tax forms to the city so it can be submitted in the city’s report to the state board of accounts.

Phillips also said that the state board of accounts sent out a memo clarifying that a grant program like the one Boggs is trying to start is legal as long as it doesn’t supersede state or federal PPP and the losses it is supposed to be addressing in businesses that received PPP handouts.

Just in time for the city’s budgeting process, which is expected to be first put to a vote within the next few weeks, the city received its wage study that was first brought up by Powers at the council’s second meeting of the year in January.

The study compared Portland employees’ wages to salaries in Centerville, Cumberland, Gas City, Hagerstown, Hartford City, Huntingburg, North Manchester and Yorktown.

Portland’s mayor and police chief are relatively underpaid according to the study. Boggs has a salary of $55,559 compared to the study’s average of $61,964 while Portland Police Chief Nathan Springer has a salary of $52,873 compared to the study’s average of $61,050.

Council members are annually paid $7,312, 10.5% more than the study’s average of $6,619, while Phillips makes $6,036 more than the study’s average clerk-treasurer wage of $49,082.

Portland’s water, street and waste management supervisors made within $200 of the study’s reported average.

Portland police officers had a starting wage of $20.28 an hour, which is more than the starting wage of officers in every city in the study except Huntingburg.

Council president Kent McClung was the lone member to vote against issuing a department-wide raise earlier in June because the city did not have the wage study to compare its officers’ wages. Springer argued his department's starting wages were not high enough to attract potential new officers to the area.

Council members and Boggs also voiced concerns over local resident and visitor behavior in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Looking out at people during the fair and last week during the vintage bike show, there’s none of that happening,” council member Dave Golden said, referring to proper social distancing and mask wearing at the fairgrounds in recent weeks.

He warned that it’s vital for the community to do everything it can to combat the spread of COVID that could be caused by the Tri-State Antique Gas Engine and Tractor Show that is scheduled for Aug. 26 through 29 at the fairgrounds.

McClung spoke to the rising amount of unfounded theories that question the effectiveness of masks, saying theories are being purported by bad actors to proliferate the pandemic.

Boggs said the county’s relatively low cumulative positive COVID count, which currently stands at 82 with seven newly reported cases since Friday, could be attributed to undertesting.

“I don’t want to run against our luck,” he added.

In other business, council members Michele Brewster, Mike Aker, Don Gillespie, Matt Goldsworthy, Golden, Powers and McClung:

•Heard from Boggs that a student-city council announced in February will be postponed for the upcoming school year because of the ongoing pandemic.

•As recommended by the city’s tax abatement advisory committee, approved annual compliance forms for businesses involved in ongoing tax abatement agreements. All businesses in active tax abatements were found to be in compliance. Those businesses include Carrera Manufacturing, Commercial Electric Company, FCC Indiana LLC, Fisher Packing Company, Fort Recovery Industries Inc., IOM Grain LLC, Joyce/Dayton Corporation, Moser Engineering, MSSL Wiring Systems, Priority Plastics, St. Henry Tile, TLS By Design LLC and Tyson Foods Inc.

•Paid $849,716.18 in claims.