Jun 6, 2018 4 min read

Washington officials plan to participate in the state Department of Community and Economic Development’s early intervention program for financially struggling communities.

City council members are expected to vote Thursday to have an early intervention study done this year. The study will look at the city’s budget and offer suggestions for changes, cuts and revenue opportunities, according to Mayor Scott Putnam.

“It’s a state program where they come in and give you suggestions to save in different areas like garbage collections, contracts and just other ways the city can save money and earn more revenue,” Putnam said.

He said that though the city doesn’t expect a deficit in next year’s budget, officials want to make sure that tax changes resulting from the county’s reassessment and unanticipated expenses won’t put the city in the red.

“We’re not in a situation where we necessarily would need this,” Putnam said. “We’re just looking at being proactive.”

When asked if one of those expenses was the building collapse at 15 N. Main St. in July, over which the city is still in litigation with building owner Mark Russo, Putnam said, “I’m sure it came into the discussion.”

City computer systems coordinator Lynn Galluze said that along with the building collapse, lawsuits, contract negotiations and aging infrastructure “put us in a position” to want the study done.

“It was good for us to be proactive,” she said. “They will come in to each department, ask a lot of questions and ask to see a lot of things.”

Putnam said the city is not yet and doesn’t want to be “in the same situation the last time we went through this.”

The city had entered the Early Intervention Program around 2007, Galluze said, when it was “teetering on” the brink of a declaration under the Financially Distressed Municipalities Act.

“It was so helpful when we did it last time,” she said. “Why not try to do it again.”

According to Sarah DeSantis, press assistant for the DCED, the city applied for its first early intervention program grant in April 2017. It received $41,587 to create a stormwater management plan, which it needed in order to renew its permit for operating a Municipal Separated Storm Sewer System (MS4).

“On April 2, 2018, the city applied for a second phase of EIP grant funding to develop a five-year financial management plan,” DeSantis wrote in an email. “As part of the second phase, an engineering firm will be hired to perform stormwater collection mapping.”

Galluze said the $200,000 grant, with a $20,000 match, was awarded in May for this second phase. About $49,000 of it will go toward the study. She said the grant application included information that showed the city has a large number of nonprofits, a large number of renters and is “basically landlocked,” with no room to expand.

Galluze said the rest of the money will go toward the stormwater mapping and other requirements mandated by the state Department of Environmental Protection to be completed over the next five years.

“Up to this point, we knew we had to do it, but we didn’t have a way to pay for it,” Galluze said.

Problems with stormwater infrastructure became evident with several major floods, particularly this year. That’s partly why the city used the EIP grant to pay for MS4 upgrades.

“We haven’t been able to find grants that are necessarily specific to stormwater,” Galluze said.

Putnam said the consulting firm Public Partners will be conducting the early intervention study and providing recommendations to “make the city stronger.”

“We’re going to look at this study with open eyes and see what we can do,” Putnam said. “After that, what the city chooses to do is completely up to the city.”