By Crystal McGough, Editor
TRUSSVILLE – The Trussville City Council adopted its budget for the 2024 fiscal year on Tuesday, Sept. 26, during the council’s regular meeting. The budget, as well as an audit for the 2021-2022 fiscal year, was discussed in the council workshop on Thursday, Sept. 21.
Trussville Boy Scouts Troop 216 led the City Council in the Pledge of Allegiance on Tuesday, Sept. 26, 2023. (Credit: Crystal McGough)
“All of the departments have been working on (the budget) for months and months,” Councilor Alan Taylor said. “We appreciate all the work done on that with the mayor, getting that where it needs to be. I think we’ve got a good budget for 2024 as our city continues to grow.”
During the workshop on Sept. 21, Mayor Buddy Choat said that the total operating revenues projected for the 2024 fiscal year are $51,836,400, with total operating expenses at $42,583,000.
Prior to adopting the budget, the council approved Resolution 2023-66, accepting the 2021-2022 audit.
“I’m real proud of the audit that we just concluded,” Choat said. “The news we got last week was what we needed to hear. It appears that all our in-house business is in order and (we) didn’t see any deficiencies there.
“A lot of things going on in the city right now,” he added later. “None bigger than just getting this budget approved and getting a good audit.”
The council also approved an ordinance to exercise the option for the city to leave the Jefferson County Personnel Board.
Councilor Ben Short explained the item as Ordinance 2023-019ADM, “an ordinance pursuant to Act 2023-460, notifying the Personnel Board of Jefferson County, Alabama, of the intent of the city of Trussville, Alabama, to separate from the Personnel Board’s jurisdiction and establish a city Civil Service System.”
Another resolution the council approved Tuesday night was Resolution 2023-70, authorizing national opioid settlement funds to go to local nonprofit Huskies Together Inc.
“Across the United States of America, in the state of Alabama, and in the city of Trussville, the opioid epidemic is an ongoing battle that is one of the greatest public health battles the U.S. has experienced,” Councilor Short read from the resolution. “…As part of a variety of national opioid litigation, where states, counties and municipalities across the country have sued opioid manufacturers, prescribers and distributers, several have been settled, resulting in the city receiving certain settlement amounts, both lump sums and periodic payments. … Having considered the most effective way to use these funds, the city has created Huskies Together Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation whose purpose is to make sure the opioid funds are used to combat and reduce drug use within the Trussville City Schools and throughout the city.”
Mayor Choat recognized and thanked the first graduating class of Leadership Trussville for the creation of Huskies Together Inc.
L-R: Councilor Jaime Anderson, Council President Lisa Bright, Councilor Alan Taylor, Councilor Ben Short. (Credit: Crystal McGough)
“This is near and dear to my heart,” Council President Lisa Bright said. “It was my team on Leadership Trussville (that selected this as their project). We worked together and we decided this was something that was needed in our high school and in all of our schools to a certain level. We are patterning it after All In Mountain Brook and Help the Hills in Vestavia Hills. It will just be an active group that gives students an opportunity to be in support groups, and resources for parents … Just grateful to be able to use these funds in a positive way that will help bring the community and the schools together.”
The council approved two proclamations declaring citywide public events. The first declared the Fourth Annual Trussville Witches Ride a citywide event.
“This group of ladies get together and they pick someone who’s deserving in the community and then it’s a really fun day for everyone to ride through Trussville and raise money for a good cause,” Councilor Jaime Anderson said.
Anderson then read from the proclamation, “Whereas a number of good-hearted witches are raising money to provide financial relief and to honor resident Jamie Lee Jones, who’s fighting Prader-Willi Syndrome, and then they wish to ride their brooms or other modes of transportation (which are bikes) from Cahaba Elementary School along North Mall and then the north end of South Chalkville Road, and then to Beech Street ending at the Ferus pavilion; therefore the mayor and city council do hereby proclaim the Fourth Annual Witches Ride, slated for Saturday, Oct. 21, 2023, as a citywide public event.”
The second proclamation declared the Friends of Pinchgut Creek Revival Festival a citywide event.
“Friends of Pinchgut Creek are bringing the community together to celebrate local watershed improvements,” Anderson read. “Therefore, the mayor and city council hereby proclaim the gathering hosting by the Friends of Pinchgut Creek at the Mall pavilion on Sunday, Oct. 15, 2023, as a citywide public event.”
“The Friends of Pinchgut Creek, they’re very active,” Anderson added. “They’ve done a lot to actually clean up the waterway out here. Pinchgut, of course, runs behind Ferus and the Entertainment District, but leads directly into the Cahaba.”
In other business, the council approved:
- Unpaid COVID Leave Policy for city employees
- A traffic signal permit for US Highway 11 and Bethune Parkway
- A resolution extending the master agreement with Ingenuity
The Trussville City Council regularly meets on the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month at 6 p.m., at the Trussville City Hall Annex. A workshop is usually held on the Thursday preceding the council meeting at 5 p.m.
