Despite coming out of two years of a pandemic, the good economic news for Chelsea continues.
Monday night, City Manager Thomas Ambrosino notified the City Council that the state’s Department of Revenue recently certified nearly $15 million in free cash in the city’s general fund at the close of Fiscal Year 2021.
Ambrosino is earmarking a portion of those funds for a number of citywide projects. The additional funds come at a time when the city is also determining the best way to spend about $40 million in federal Covid-19 relief funds.
In addition, over $4 million in free cash was certified by the state in the city’s water and sewer enterprise funds.
“These reserves reflect the City’s positive financial conditions,” Ambrosino wrote to the council. “Given the surpluses, I am writing now to seek reinvestment of a portion of these funds into programs, projects and efforts that will continue to benefit our residents. I also am looking to cover some deficits for FY22 that have already surfaced.”
Ambrosino’s financial requests included almost $150,000 to continue the city’s Bunker Hill Scholarship Program for Chelsea High School students for a fifth year. He is also requesting that $50,000 be used to continue a transportation program that brings senior citizens to the Senior Center through the end of FY23.
A downtown initiative for $400,000 would help local businesses continue to recover from the impact of Covid-19, Ambrosino stated.
“The effort will be substantially advanced if we invest in things like support for outdoor dining, another round of storefront improvements, more murals and public art and additional activities and nighttime events in the Downtown,” the City Manager stated.
The requests also include $60,000 for a software update for the human resources department, $50,000 for new banners for streetlight poles throughout the city, $50,000 for crosswalk signage, and $293,000 for public safety improvements for buildings on the Forbes site.
Ambrosino is also requesting $147,000 for a Massport Noise study, something that was requested by the City Council prior to the Covid-19 pandemic.
“After much difficulty, mostly due to the hesitancy of local experts to take an adverse stance to Massport, the city did find a firm in Georgia that was willing to conduct such a study,” said Ambrosino.
While airport noise is down somewhat due to less air traffic during the pandemic, Ambrosino said the council may want to still move forward with a study to help with future discussions with Massport over noise mitigation.
There are also several requests related to the public works department, including $320,000 for small capital projects throughout the city,
$35,000 for buildings and grounds overtime, $40,000 for street and sidewalk work, and $160,000 for street and sidewalk work overtime and another $70,000 for water and sewer work overtime.
Ambrosino said some of the money will also be used to cover some deficit costs in outside legal services, unemployment, parking department contract costs, and DPW solid waste disposal.
The City Council referred the requests for further discussion at a future subcommittee on finance meeting.