Bond Funding 2003, 2006 - Laserfiche WebLink

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assets, including the Airport, and the wastewater and stormwater systems. However, other City infrastructure systems face a current, and growing, need for reinvestment in deferred maintenance. A Council goal could be to adopt a set of strategies that ensure funding to reduce or eliminate the backlog of maintenance needs for all City infrastructure. The City currently has approximately 140 structures, with a replacement value of about $120 million. Although the Council has supported a capital budget of $1.9 million for preservation of General Fund buildings, the annual investment in capital preservation and maintenance continues to be underfunded. The deferred maintenance on these facilities is increasing. The additions to builidng inventory, including the new Fire stations, the 911 Center and, in the next few years, a new Library, will increase the annual maintenance needs, further limiting the ability to commit funds to address the backlog in facilities maintenance. The development of new park facilities will also increase the demand on the General Fund to fund maintenance of those facilities. Currently, the City's investment in parks maintenance is below the average for similar communities within the region. Even with increased partnership with volunteers and community groups donating labor or funds for parks improvements and maintenance, the City will still need additional resources. In a survey done for the Mayor's Parks and Open Space Committee, Eugene ranked 16 our of 22 cities and parks districts in measures of expenditures per acre of park land and per capita. One of the recommendations in the Committee's final report to the Council included "...a tax measure to fund increased park maintenance should be placed before the voters within two years." The City's surface transportation system also has a backlog of deferred street preservation needs. The actual level of resources available to address street preservation has decreased in the past few years, as Lane County has reduced the level of revenue shared with cities within the County. In Eugene's case, this has meant a reduction of approximately $1 million over four years. The City's transportation services must also address the community's growing expectations around growth management, neighborhood livability and traffic calming at the same time that the City is faced with revenue constraints to implement additional services. As the cost of ongoing maintenance of the expanding street network increases, the ability of the City to adequately address the growing backlog of street preservation needs has decreased. The street condition analysis completed as part of the Transplan update found that a current backlog of $38.8 million in street preservation needs. Even with increases in State gas taxes, which are the City's only current source of revenue for maintenance of the transportation system, the City will not have enough resources to address the preservation backlog. A new local revenue source will be required to fully address this backlog. Potential strategies to address a Council goal of meeting this range of maintenance needs could include: - Reduce or eliminate the deferred maintenance backlog for General Fund buildings and facilities. - Adopt a long -range facility investment strategy to fund an adequate level of ongoing maintenance and preservation of City buildings.