Brighton City Manager Nate Geinzer unveiled the proposed 2018-19 city budget, which includes a healthy end-of-year fund balance of $2.5 million, at Thursday's City Council meeting. The general fund budget totals about $8.75 million, and Geinzer says that’s up slightly from the 2017-18 fiscal year budget of about $8.5 million. The current fiscal year ends on June 30th.

One major problem municipalities in Michigan have been facing in recent years is that of unfunded liabilities. In 2017, the Responsible Retirement Reform for Local Government Task Force found about $7.5 billion in unfunded pension liabilities and $10.1 billion in unfunded health care liabilities in local governments' finances. Geinzer says that under his city budget proposal, Brighton will be increasing its contribution to the unfunded OPEB, or retirement, liabilities, and its unfunded pension liability.

The city will be conducting three, and possibly four, workshops in the near future to discuss and fine tune the budget for the coming year. Sessions are scheduled for next Tuesday, April 10th, at 6 p.m., Thursday, April 12th, at 5:30 p.m., Tuesday, April 17th, at 6 p.m., and with a fourth date on Thursday, April 19th at 5:30 p.m., if necessary. All sessions will be held at city hall. A public hearing on the recommended 2018-19 city budget will be held at the May 3rd council meeting. (TT)