Kendall County Times

The Joliet city manager recently gave a report and answers some questions on the budget.

During a Nov. 15 city council meeting, Joliet city manager, James Capparelli, discussed some concerns about the city’s budget for 2023 and he talked about some of those in his report. One of the subjects was about the extra $1 million being added to the street program. He explained that the city can easily accommodate it, and that it wouldn’t be dipping into any savings or other funds, but that the city had enough revenue to add that, and they would just be putting less away into savings.

"We have more than enough revenue to support that request," Capparelli said. 

Capparelli also said that they have enough revenue to add $100,000 to the weed removal and reduction fund that had been requested by another council member. The only issue with that fund is that it is a new program, so they aren’t sure how to allocate funding properly. The council plans to execute the normal downtown plans and then expand outward and get bids, and then more funds can be a part of the budget in the following years after they get a better understanding of prices and program scope.

The final item that was addressed in the budget was the sidewalk fund. In 2022 they funded $250,000 plus an additional $500,000 for the sidewalk. For the 2023 budget, it was bumped up to $800,000 total proposed for the sidewalk fund. Councilman Hug requested that they transfer an additional $200,000 from the street fund to make it an even million to show that fixing the city sidewalks is a priority in the city, so the council amended that in the budget as well.