Radford Council Begins Work on Budget
By DAVID QUESENBERRY
Patriot Publishing
The Radford City Council began its work on the Fiscal Year 2026-2027 budget on Monday evening with a budget work session with the City Manager and Finance Staff.
First order of business was a review of the budget calendar by City Manager Todd Meredith. He told Council that Department Heads were working on their budgets using the Zero-Based Budgeting method. The method requires expenditures for departments to start at zero with expenditures gradually added to the line items of the budget, along with an explanation of what the expenditure was for.
As explained in an earlier meeting the purpose of using this method was to capture historic or “legacy” spending for items that may no longer be needed, thereby promoting savings in the budget.
Meredith told City Council that he was currently working on the revenues for the budget.
According to the schedule, from February to early March budgets from each department will be submitted to the City Manager for review, followed by discussions between the manager and department heads of their proposed budgets.
Preparation of a draft budget would then take place during the remainder of March, with the draft budget along with draft ordinances for the budget, tax rates, utility rates and fees being submitted to Council at a work session on April 1st.
A public hearing and first reading on all the budget related ordinances would be held on April 20th, with the second reading and potential passage of the budget on April 27th. The budget would go into effect on July 1, 2026.
According to Mayor David Horton, the work sessions were not planned to be streamed for the community online. Council’s decision was needed as to whether or not a work session or special session would be held for the discussion of issues such as the audit presentation. He also urged that a meeting with the School Board be held prior to April 1st. Additional meetings could be scheduled in April if the need arose, which could be work sessions or special sessions of Council.
City Manager Meredith said he would be looking at audited collection rates over the last ten years in his work on revenues. His review of revenues would include the high and low values as determined by his budget analysis.
Horton cautioned falling back on the lower estimates, while Vice-Mayor Seth Gillespie said to hold to the conservative side since what he termed “cautious optimism” had not worked. Meredith said both high and low values would be shown on his presentation.
Council next reviewed a funding report showing funds requested by community agencies.
In a preliminary review of the list of funding requests, Councilwoman Kellie Artrip suggested Council not fund agencies that had not requested funding for the current year. Council agreed and tentatively removed some agencies from consideration. The amount of requests from some agencies, Council learned, was mandated by the state where a percentage of the agency budget had to be requested.
Other agencies required funding from the City. Council decided to study the requests further pending more information on some of the agencies and their request for funds.
The last item of work session business was a discussion on a cost of living increase for City employees.
Councilwoman Jessi Foster thought this should be considered due to the downsizing of the City’s work force.
Vice-Mayor Gillespie favored the measure, but thought the cost would have to be offset in other areas. The main consideration was the cost of insurance. Meredith said the City put its health and dental insurance out to bid on January 5th and had received bids back which were being reviewed. He said he would have more specific information by next week. Gillespie said the City needed to take care of its people and infrastructure.
In the regular meeting which followed the work session, Council received an update from Fire Chief Rodney Haywood and Director of Parks and Recreation Charlie Goins on reimbursement requests from FEMA for damages from Hurricane Helene.
Chief Haywood said the city had received $34,723 for debris removal. For emergency protective measures related to the animal shelter and road blockages, $41,050 had been obligated but not disbursed to the City. FEMA was conducting an Environmental Historic Preservation review for erosion at the Little River Dam with $103,659 and a FEMA match of $77,044 being obligated but not yet disbursed to the City. FEMA was currently reviewing claims for damage to buildings and Parks and Recreation facilities and for demolition and reconstruction of the animal shelter. A submission for management costs could not be completed until all work was finished.
Director Goins reviewed a list of damages in Parks and Recreation. The listing classified damages as non-replaceable or postponed; repaired; and completion needed as soon as possible.
Concerning items that might not be replaced, Mayor Horton asked if reimbursement funds from FEMA received in the next two or three weeks could be applied to the purchase of postponed items such as picnic tables or equipment. He ventured that the City could apply for reimbursement again for these purchases.
Goins replied that there were other projects that had to be taken care of first mentioning backstop pads at Veterans One field for high school softball games. After a short discussion of seeking sponsors for some of the postponed items, City Manager Gillespie said that work would continue on the “high need” items.
The next scheduled meeting of the Radford City Council will be at 7:00 p.m., Monday, February 23, 2026 in the Council Chambers of the Radford City Hall at 10 Robertson Street.