Unknown Speaker
Hello and welcome to ask the mayor on WFIU. I'm Joe Hren, first week of the month. And as always, we find ourselves in Columbus with Mayor Jim Lienhoop. Hello, welcome. Thanks for being on the show. You're welcome.
Unknown Speaker
It's good to be back in person. Yeah, I think we've been zoom in for a couple of years. Yeah. And so, so yeah, it's good to be back in person.
Unknown Speaker
And I know we've had a few misses here with schedule. So it's nice to be back and see again and catch up. We have a few things to get to, we'll get right away to something I just read in the news, you mentioned it before the interview started. And that is the airport needs a new tower. Right, right, and just didn't get the funds that you really hoped you were gonna
Unknown Speaker
get, we were a little disappointed, we thought we had gotten the the appropriate head nod from the FAA that we were in line for a grant to construct a new tower. And what we found out was that the money went to a little bit different, different use, instead of completing a couple of new towers to new towers, you know, in our region, they chose to try to modernize or to refurbish about 20. And so from a, from a bureaucrats perspective, I kind of get it and they were able to take a finite amount of money and affect 20 places rather than that same finite amount of amount of money affecting two places. But we've been given indication that perhaps we could take a little bit different path. And that different path would be to apply for a grant for the engineering and design of a tower. And we might be able to do that say yet this year, in anticipation of requesting funds for construction in a later year. And the whole idea is that by breaking it up into two smaller numbers, we maybe enhance our chances of success. So so we got another meeting, headed, headed our way this afternoon, to meet with our consultants and see what we can, what we can shake loose.
Unknown Speaker
So let's go from the airport to a golf course here, the city sold otter Creek Golf Course, what were the terms and why?
Unknown Speaker
Well, the why is pretty simple. I mean, you know, we sort of started on this path in late 2020, maybe 2019. Time runs away from me. But what we realized when Cummins sort of stepped back from an active management role at otter creek that, you know, the city found itself with 54 holes of golf. And that's just more golf than what we needed. And we really didn't necessarily know which of the 54 were excess, or really, you know, how to how to sort of noodle through that. And so we've had a couple of different approaches. The one we settled upon most recently was to try to find a buyer for otter Creek. And so in January of this year, we issued a request for proposal, we got a respondent, and we've been negotiating with that person ever since we announced a in the media in the newspaper, I think that was last week's board works meeting, we approved authorization for me to sign a contract to to affect the sale. And so we were proceeding forward, we are anticipating being able to close here within the next few days. But it seems like there's always a few last minute questions that pop up. And so we're gonna have to deal with those and hopefully get this behind us in a week or so. But But yeah, we've agreed to sell otter Creek and the whole notion was to find a buyer who had respect for the course and for its history. It's still the only Robert Trent Jones course or design in Indiana. And of course, since Robert Trent Jones is no longer with us, it will all it will remain you know the only one in Colombia right now in Indiana. We also realized too, that there is a significant amount of financial commitment that comes with that and so it was more important for us to receive from the eventual buyer a commitment to continue to invest. There are some there are some improvements that need to be made to the course I mean, what I try to explain to people everything out there that's green, it's really in pretty good shape. And it's the stuff that's not green like the cart pass and the irrigation system you know, that really needs some assistance and so you know, Mr. Hat ad is committed to, to working with those to make any investment that's needed to bring those up to par. No pun intended. At the same time. We know there's some work that needs to be done on the clubhouse. The clubhouse is one of the architectural gems we have here in Columbus designed by Harry Weise back in 1964. It it really is a neat design. I mean, it's a really comfortable building, and it shows the course and shows the community really well. But there are a lot of elements of that building that are original, and there's a lot of glass out there. And it's all single pane you know, pretty, pretty straightforward. Glass that was installed in 1964 and needs to be needs to be replaced. The roof we have got some leak issues and we need to deal with HVAC and the plumbing. It all dates again From from that era, so, so we know that there'll be some investment required, you know, in that location as well. And so, again, what we've got from our buyer, Mr. Robert head, Jr, is a commitment to spend $5 million to address these rehabilitation or refurbishment needs. And we're really pleased, you know, that he's willing to step forward and, and accept the mantle, so to speak with respect to how that course is managed going forward, and, and willingness to make the investment that's needed.
Unknown Speaker
Any more information on the buyer,
Unknown Speaker
or the buyers? Robert had dad Jr. That name will be familiar to people from Columbus, their family's been here in town for, oh, I don't know, 6070 years, but maybe not 70. But they used to run a company here called Columbus container. And they own or have owned for a while now. Harrison like Country Club. And so they've already got a significant golf activity here in Columbus. And this will add to that. And I think it'll give them an opportunity for some synergy that just wasn't available to the city.
Unknown Speaker
Interesting, yeah, that it helps give some background for those of us who who don't live here and sure know that name. This is something too that dropped off my list last time, we just ran out of time, but without paid parking downtown. And I know that we talked about this a year ago. And I think maybe that's when the study was being formed about this. But there's been some more new information coming out on that,
Unknown Speaker
well, there's always new information, there's always more talk and paid parking is a subject that just doesn't want to go away. And and it doesn't want to solve itself, right? What we've got are some folks who who want to ensure that there is turnover among the people who the patrons, you know who parked downtown, there is a lot of anecdotal evidence that some people show up and then park all day long, it was a little bit more of an issue before the pandemic than it is today. But nonetheless, we have people who are still interested in trying to find a solution. And a variety of things get discussed. You know, right now, you're allowed to park in downtown Columbus for three hours at no charge. But we expect you to move you know, after the end of the third hour, that might be replaced by a metered opportunity or metered solution, whether that meter is the old style, individual meters, where you put a quarter in or a nickel in or what have you, or whether we do something a little bit more modern, like I've seen in Bloomington and Indianapolis, where you've got electronic meters that you use in conjunction with an app on your phone. I mean, I find them a little expensive, but they're very convenient. I mean, it's just really an easy way to manage your parking, and an easy way to be reminded, you know, when it's your turn to go move your car. But my sense is that, you know, obviously no decision has been reached, and it's going to be a while, before we get to we get to a decision.
Unknown Speaker
If that were to come about, is there any thought about where that money would go? That's coming in from all those meters?
Unknown Speaker
Well, I you know, you talk about money. I think we're talking quarters and dimes. I mean, I don't think it's going to be any great windfall. And really, it'll go just maintain the system, because you'll still have to pay for attendance, you know, to go out and monitor and enforce those folks who overstay their welcome. And then there'll be costs associated with the installation and the maintenance of the whatever apparatus we choose whether it's meters or kiosks or what have you.
Unknown Speaker
So being in town here today, I drove around a little bit and saw the Court Services Building is almost done. Yeah. And I know that's, that's part of a bigger project of moving things around downtown to make way for what you hope to be a conference center. Right. So I thought I'd get an update on that.
Unknown Speaker
Well, thanks for asking. Yeah, the the Hotel Conference Center sort of took a Oh hiatus, if that's the right word, throughout the pandemic, and we've kind of brought that back up on the table. We've had some meetings and discussions with the developer that we've chosen sprayed hotel developers. And, you know, one of the first steps in terms of trying to make that make that happen is to clear the ground. We've identified a parking lot that is currently owned by the county, and the Court Services building or the court services building activity is conducted there at the corner of third and Franklin. And so we want to want to tear that building down. But in order to do that, we had to move the activity that's going on there to another location. And so with, in partnership with Bartholomew County, we have constructed a new building that we call the Court Services building, it's on Second Street just to meet or excuse me, it's on First Street immediately south of the jail. And yeah, it's, it's like 98.9% done. I mean, there's a few light bulbs that need to be put in there. There's that really well. The bigger hang ups we've got right now is just connecting the fire alarm system. Into the Emergency Operations Center. There's a hardwire connection that has to has to be effected there. And so we can't quite get moved in just yet. But I really do believe that we're within about two to three weeks I haven't yet done. And then we'll be able to move the probation department from its current location, third Lafayette to its new location at first and Lafayette. And so I said third, Lafayette, third, Franklin, to first and Lafayette. So yeah, we're kind of excited about that. And when that happens, so we will, in short order at begin to prep the site there, in that, as I said, that parking lot will tear down the building that currently houses probation. There's a few underground storage tanks that we've identified, and those will get pulled. And then we'll be ready to start with the hotel. You know, when that happens? So yeah, it's coming together, it's, it never seems to happen quite on the timeframe that we originally anticipate. But we're gonna get there.
Unknown Speaker
I mean, a lot has happened since that discussion first began to and I know, you mentioned the land is owned by the county, how does the city and the county work together on this conference center moving forward, when you have different entities with different parts?
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, it's a Rubik's cube. And it's really is a little bit of a, an effort to sort of get everything lined up. But we'll we'll swap the new building and the land, you know, that we talked about on First Street with the old building and the old land on, on third, on Third Street, parking becomes an issue we've arranged for the county to have, I want to say it's 100 150 spaces as part of the apartment complex development. And then we've promised them a floor in the to be constructed a parking garage, you know, that will be part of the Hotel Conference Center complex. So So yeah, it I say there's several steps, you know, that you have to go through and you have to go through in sequence, right? I mean, it doesn't seem like we can, you know, get out of line. But be out, the next step that you'll see is a move from the the old Probation Department to the new and then we'll raise that building and dig those tanks out of the ground, and, hopefully, Marriott or somebody will show up more than build a hotel.
Unknown Speaker
And and the conference part, how does that part happen?
Unknown Speaker
Well, it comes along the same time. You know, I anticipate one contract from spread developers to one one construction company, to build a hotel and I have a conference center attached to it. And, you know, the we will look to the Sprague's to, to manage the Conference Center, and it will be an opportunity for them to, you know, help fill their hotel as well as bring people to downtown Columbus, right?
Unknown Speaker
Well, it's that time of the year to we've been talking with all the mayors about budgeting, it's not a exciting thing for those listening at home, I know. But it's a huge part of what you do.
Unknown Speaker
It's a lot like watching paint dry. I mean, it really can be a sort of your eyes glaze over. But, but it's critically important, you know, to what we what we try to do here, and we're trying to provide all the services that people want out of a municipality. At the same time, we try to manage the tax rate that we charge. Last year, we were fortunate that the rate went down went from about a buck 15 per $100 of assessed valuation to a buck 11. And what we're going to try to do is stick around Buck 11. But it may get back up there to a buck 15. I mean, we just don't know yet. critical component of our budget this year is what we pay our people, you know, we have, we really face it into two areas. One of the things is that part of what we do is really important, I mean, we're talking first responders, and as the name implies, these are people who come to you come to help you in case of an emergency. So we're talking police, fire, emergency services, folks, paramedics, EMTs, and whatnot. We we see we have seen some turnover in those areas that we we kind of attributed to a little competition with other providers of those kinds of services. And so for those folks, we anticipate a nearly 8% raise, and that's combination of inflation to some of the inflationary pressures that we receive. But it's also a little what I would call competition, I mean with with other communities, you know, with other jurisdictions because everybody's in the same boat, we're all chasing, seemingly a smaller pool of people. With respect to non sworn, as I mentioned, police, police and fire were the nearly 8% non sworn 6% And again, you know, the City of Columbus employs about 420 530 full time equivalents. And the last time I checked our open positions were close to 20. So it's not a convenient place to be when you think you're lean to begin with. It's not a convenient place to be when a lot of what you do is, you know, essential services for for our community, whether it's sanitation, waterworks, or what have you. So, so we're going to try to try to address it So for those compensation issues through the budget, and at the same time hold the tax rate, you know, within reason. So it's, it's going to be a little bit of a challenge this year. But But yeah, it all starts about now and will conclude sometime around the end of October.
Unknown Speaker
It's an $89 million budget, from what I read in a local paper here. Has there been any hit that you're seeing from COVID? In 2020? To kind of?
Unknown Speaker
Well, we're not yet you know, I'm told that the local assessor has moderated some of the commercial assessments, in reflection of the fact that some of those commercial activities were hindered by COVID. But we've not seen that show up yet in our tax collection, so we just have to sort of wait to see.
Unknown Speaker
And I guess I can ask the opposite to are you seeing more revenue streaming coming in? That's inflating your budget, you know, to 89 million? Yeah,
Unknown Speaker
actually, we've been told to anticipate, you know, a three and a half or 4% increase in, you know, on our income tax revenue, and in our property tax revenue. So, again, we were told that those numbers come from estimators in Indianapolis is that if that's a nice way to say it, and and there are times when they've been accurate, and times when they haven't. So we just try to approach it with a little bit of caution. At the end of the day, you know, the budget is important, but it all it does is set the tax rate, it then is incumbent upon us to spend wisely. And so we will work it's really a two, two step process. The first step is develop a budget and set a tax rate, then we try to figure out, you know, what we can really spend and, and make, make it all work. So, so yeah, stay tuned. The interesting,
Unknown Speaker
why do you have so many new things going on? You talked about Nexus Park, which we didn't get to today, and Gregory talks about a conference center. And so there must be new lines that need to be added for those as well?
Unknown Speaker
Well, there are but and with those will come some new lines for revenue, we anticipate Nexus Park being able to generate a fair amount of revenue and basically pay for itself if not a little bit more. And the same with the Hotel Conference Center. You know, what we've learned is that tourism is a real thing, right? I mean, people come here. And when they do, they tend to spend some money, either whether it's a gas, or an ice cream cone or a night lodging or a meal. And so we want to be able to generate that kind of activity in our local economy. And promoting tourism is a great way to do that.
Unknown Speaker
Just a couple minutes left to any update from city council or things that are coming up announcements that we should know about. Joe,
Unknown Speaker
you have mentioned, we're the community of the year. I mean, the City of Columbus was named community of the Year by the Indiana chamber. And yeah, we had a big O announcement party Monday of last week. And there's going to be a formal announcement award ceremony in November. And yeah, we couldn't be more pleased. You know, we tell ourselves that we want to be an extraordinary community won't be the best community of our size in the country. And what was really kind of neat about this was that we didn't apply for this. I mean, with a lot of these awards, you have to nominate yourself, but we didn't do that. And so to be called out of the blue and told Yeah, we've picked you out of all the, you know, whatever the number is 120 Some communities in Indiana. Yeah, it was kind of special gives us a little validation, you know, that perhaps we weren't perhaps we're doing a few things. Right. You know, we talk about all the challenges and there are there are some but every now and then we get something right and I feel kind of happy for for the people in the community who've worked so hard to make Columbus up a welcoming and diverse place a safe community with great education for for kids. In great recreational opportunities for our residents. Yeah, it's it's a big pat on the back for everybody.
Unknown Speaker
Thank you so much for your time. We'll see you October. Take care
Hello and welcome to ask the mayor on WFIU. I'm Joe Hren, first week of the month. And as always, we find ourselves in Columbus with Mayor Jim Lienhoop. Hello, welcome. Thanks for being on the show. You're welcome.
Unknown Speaker
It's good to be back in person. Yeah, I think we've been zoom in for a couple of years. Yeah. And so, so yeah, it's good to be back in person.
Unknown Speaker
And I know we've had a few misses here with schedule. So it's nice to be back and see again and catch up. We have a few things to get to, we'll get right away to something I just read in the news, you mentioned it before the interview started. And that is the airport needs a new tower. Right, right, and just didn't get the funds that you really hoped you were gonna
Unknown Speaker
get, we were a little disappointed, we thought we had gotten the the appropriate head nod from the FAA that we were in line for a grant to construct a new tower. And what we found out was that the money went to a little bit different, different use, instead of completing a couple of new towers to new towers, you know, in our region, they chose to try to modernize or to refurbish about 20. And so from a, from a bureaucrats perspective, I kind of get it and they were able to take a finite amount of money and affect 20 places rather than that same finite amount of amount of money affecting two places. But we've been given indication that perhaps we could take a little bit different path. And that different path would be to apply for a grant for the engineering and design of a tower. And we might be able to do that say yet this year, in anticipation of requesting funds for construction in a later year. And the whole idea is that by breaking it up into two smaller numbers, we maybe enhance our chances of success. So so we got another meeting, headed, headed our way this afternoon, to meet with our consultants and see what we can, what we can shake loose.
Unknown Speaker
So let's go from the airport to a golf course here, the city sold otter Creek Golf Course, what were the terms and why?
Unknown Speaker
Well, the why is pretty simple. I mean, you know, we sort of started on this path in late 2020, maybe 2019. Time runs away from me. But what we realized when Cummins sort of stepped back from an active management role at otter creek that, you know, the city found itself with 54 holes of golf. And that's just more golf than what we needed. And we really didn't necessarily know which of the 54 were excess, or really, you know, how to how to sort of noodle through that. And so we've had a couple of different approaches. The one we settled upon most recently was to try to find a buyer for otter Creek. And so in January of this year, we issued a request for proposal, we got a respondent, and we've been negotiating with that person ever since we announced a in the media in the newspaper, I think that was last week's board works meeting, we approved authorization for me to sign a contract to to affect the sale. And so we were proceeding forward, we are anticipating being able to close here within the next few days. But it seems like there's always a few last minute questions that pop up. And so we're gonna have to deal with those and hopefully get this behind us in a week or so. But But yeah, we've agreed to sell otter Creek and the whole notion was to find a buyer who had respect for the course and for its history. It's still the only Robert Trent Jones course or design in Indiana. And of course, since Robert Trent Jones is no longer with us, it will all it will remain you know the only one in Colombia right now in Indiana. We also realized too, that there is a significant amount of financial commitment that comes with that and so it was more important for us to receive from the eventual buyer a commitment to continue to invest. There are some there are some improvements that need to be made to the course I mean, what I try to explain to people everything out there that's green, it's really in pretty good shape. And it's the stuff that's not green like the cart pass and the irrigation system you know, that really needs some assistance and so you know, Mr. Hat ad is committed to, to working with those to make any investment that's needed to bring those up to par. No pun intended. At the same time. We know there's some work that needs to be done on the clubhouse. The clubhouse is one of the architectural gems we have here in Columbus designed by Harry Weise back in 1964. It it really is a neat design. I mean, it's a really comfortable building, and it shows the course and shows the community really well. But there are a lot of elements of that building that are original, and there's a lot of glass out there. And it's all single pane you know, pretty, pretty straightforward. Glass that was installed in 1964 and needs to be needs to be replaced. The roof we have got some leak issues and we need to deal with HVAC and the plumbing. It all dates again From from that era, so, so we know that there'll be some investment required, you know, in that location as well. And so, again, what we've got from our buyer, Mr. Robert head, Jr, is a commitment to spend $5 million to address these rehabilitation or refurbishment needs. And we're really pleased, you know, that he's willing to step forward and, and accept the mantle, so to speak with respect to how that course is managed going forward, and, and willingness to make the investment that's needed.
Unknown Speaker
Any more information on the buyer,
Unknown Speaker
or the buyers? Robert had dad Jr. That name will be familiar to people from Columbus, their family's been here in town for, oh, I don't know, 6070 years, but maybe not 70. But they used to run a company here called Columbus container. And they own or have owned for a while now. Harrison like Country Club. And so they've already got a significant golf activity here in Columbus. And this will add to that. And I think it'll give them an opportunity for some synergy that just wasn't available to the city.
Unknown Speaker
Interesting, yeah, that it helps give some background for those of us who who don't live here and sure know that name. This is something too that dropped off my list last time, we just ran out of time, but without paid parking downtown. And I know that we talked about this a year ago. And I think maybe that's when the study was being formed about this. But there's been some more new information coming out on that,
Unknown Speaker
well, there's always new information, there's always more talk and paid parking is a subject that just doesn't want to go away. And and it doesn't want to solve itself, right? What we've got are some folks who who want to ensure that there is turnover among the people who the patrons, you know who parked downtown, there is a lot of anecdotal evidence that some people show up and then park all day long, it was a little bit more of an issue before the pandemic than it is today. But nonetheless, we have people who are still interested in trying to find a solution. And a variety of things get discussed. You know, right now, you're allowed to park in downtown Columbus for three hours at no charge. But we expect you to move you know, after the end of the third hour, that might be replaced by a metered opportunity or metered solution, whether that meter is the old style, individual meters, where you put a quarter in or a nickel in or what have you, or whether we do something a little bit more modern, like I've seen in Bloomington and Indianapolis, where you've got electronic meters that you use in conjunction with an app on your phone. I mean, I find them a little expensive, but they're very convenient. I mean, it's just really an easy way to manage your parking, and an easy way to be reminded, you know, when it's your turn to go move your car. But my sense is that, you know, obviously no decision has been reached, and it's going to be a while, before we get to we get to a decision.
Unknown Speaker
If that were to come about, is there any thought about where that money would go? That's coming in from all those meters?
Unknown Speaker
Well, I you know, you talk about money. I think we're talking quarters and dimes. I mean, I don't think it's going to be any great windfall. And really, it'll go just maintain the system, because you'll still have to pay for attendance, you know, to go out and monitor and enforce those folks who overstay their welcome. And then there'll be costs associated with the installation and the maintenance of the whatever apparatus we choose whether it's meters or kiosks or what have you.
Unknown Speaker
So being in town here today, I drove around a little bit and saw the Court Services Building is almost done. Yeah. And I know that's, that's part of a bigger project of moving things around downtown to make way for what you hope to be a conference center. Right. So I thought I'd get an update on that.
Unknown Speaker
Well, thanks for asking. Yeah, the the Hotel Conference Center sort of took a Oh hiatus, if that's the right word, throughout the pandemic, and we've kind of brought that back up on the table. We've had some meetings and discussions with the developer that we've chosen sprayed hotel developers. And, you know, one of the first steps in terms of trying to make that make that happen is to clear the ground. We've identified a parking lot that is currently owned by the county, and the Court Services building or the court services building activity is conducted there at the corner of third and Franklin. And so we want to want to tear that building down. But in order to do that, we had to move the activity that's going on there to another location. And so with, in partnership with Bartholomew County, we have constructed a new building that we call the Court Services building, it's on Second Street just to meet or excuse me, it's on First Street immediately south of the jail. And yeah, it's, it's like 98.9% done. I mean, there's a few light bulbs that need to be put in there. There's that really well. The bigger hang ups we've got right now is just connecting the fire alarm system. Into the Emergency Operations Center. There's a hardwire connection that has to has to be effected there. And so we can't quite get moved in just yet. But I really do believe that we're within about two to three weeks I haven't yet done. And then we'll be able to move the probation department from its current location, third Lafayette to its new location at first and Lafayette. And so I said third, Lafayette, third, Franklin, to first and Lafayette. So yeah, we're kind of excited about that. And when that happens, so we will, in short order at begin to prep the site there, in that, as I said, that parking lot will tear down the building that currently houses probation. There's a few underground storage tanks that we've identified, and those will get pulled. And then we'll be ready to start with the hotel. You know, when that happens? So yeah, it's coming together, it's, it never seems to happen quite on the timeframe that we originally anticipate. But we're gonna get there.
Unknown Speaker
I mean, a lot has happened since that discussion first began to and I know, you mentioned the land is owned by the county, how does the city and the county work together on this conference center moving forward, when you have different entities with different parts?
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, it's a Rubik's cube. And it's really is a little bit of a, an effort to sort of get everything lined up. But we'll we'll swap the new building and the land, you know, that we talked about on First Street with the old building and the old land on, on third, on Third Street, parking becomes an issue we've arranged for the county to have, I want to say it's 100 150 spaces as part of the apartment complex development. And then we've promised them a floor in the to be constructed a parking garage, you know, that will be part of the Hotel Conference Center complex. So So yeah, it I say there's several steps, you know, that you have to go through and you have to go through in sequence, right? I mean, it doesn't seem like we can, you know, get out of line. But be out, the next step that you'll see is a move from the the old Probation Department to the new and then we'll raise that building and dig those tanks out of the ground, and, hopefully, Marriott or somebody will show up more than build a hotel.
Unknown Speaker
And and the conference part, how does that part happen?
Unknown Speaker
Well, it comes along the same time. You know, I anticipate one contract from spread developers to one one construction company, to build a hotel and I have a conference center attached to it. And, you know, the we will look to the Sprague's to, to manage the Conference Center, and it will be an opportunity for them to, you know, help fill their hotel as well as bring people to downtown Columbus, right?
Unknown Speaker
Well, it's that time of the year to we've been talking with all the mayors about budgeting, it's not a exciting thing for those listening at home, I know. But it's a huge part of what you do.
Unknown Speaker
It's a lot like watching paint dry. I mean, it really can be a sort of your eyes glaze over. But, but it's critically important, you know, to what we what we try to do here, and we're trying to provide all the services that people want out of a municipality. At the same time, we try to manage the tax rate that we charge. Last year, we were fortunate that the rate went down went from about a buck 15 per $100 of assessed valuation to a buck 11. And what we're going to try to do is stick around Buck 11. But it may get back up there to a buck 15. I mean, we just don't know yet. critical component of our budget this year is what we pay our people, you know, we have, we really face it into two areas. One of the things is that part of what we do is really important, I mean, we're talking first responders, and as the name implies, these are people who come to you come to help you in case of an emergency. So we're talking police, fire, emergency services, folks, paramedics, EMTs, and whatnot. We we see we have seen some turnover in those areas that we we kind of attributed to a little competition with other providers of those kinds of services. And so for those folks, we anticipate a nearly 8% raise, and that's combination of inflation to some of the inflationary pressures that we receive. But it's also a little what I would call competition, I mean with with other communities, you know, with other jurisdictions because everybody's in the same boat, we're all chasing, seemingly a smaller pool of people. With respect to non sworn, as I mentioned, police, police and fire were the nearly 8% non sworn 6% And again, you know, the City of Columbus employs about 420 530 full time equivalents. And the last time I checked our open positions were close to 20. So it's not a convenient place to be when you think you're lean to begin with. It's not a convenient place to be when a lot of what you do is, you know, essential services for for our community, whether it's sanitation, waterworks, or what have you. So, so we're going to try to try to address it So for those compensation issues through the budget, and at the same time hold the tax rate, you know, within reason. So it's, it's going to be a little bit of a challenge this year. But But yeah, it all starts about now and will conclude sometime around the end of October.
Unknown Speaker
It's an $89 million budget, from what I read in a local paper here. Has there been any hit that you're seeing from COVID? In 2020? To kind of?
Unknown Speaker
Well, we're not yet you know, I'm told that the local assessor has moderated some of the commercial assessments, in reflection of the fact that some of those commercial activities were hindered by COVID. But we've not seen that show up yet in our tax collection, so we just have to sort of wait to see.
Unknown Speaker
And I guess I can ask the opposite to are you seeing more revenue streaming coming in? That's inflating your budget, you know, to 89 million? Yeah,
Unknown Speaker
actually, we've been told to anticipate, you know, a three and a half or 4% increase in, you know, on our income tax revenue, and in our property tax revenue. So, again, we were told that those numbers come from estimators in Indianapolis is that if that's a nice way to say it, and and there are times when they've been accurate, and times when they haven't. So we just try to approach it with a little bit of caution. At the end of the day, you know, the budget is important, but it all it does is set the tax rate, it then is incumbent upon us to spend wisely. And so we will work it's really a two, two step process. The first step is develop a budget and set a tax rate, then we try to figure out, you know, what we can really spend and, and make, make it all work. So, so yeah, stay tuned. The interesting,
Unknown Speaker
why do you have so many new things going on? You talked about Nexus Park, which we didn't get to today, and Gregory talks about a conference center. And so there must be new lines that need to be added for those as well?
Unknown Speaker
Well, there are but and with those will come some new lines for revenue, we anticipate Nexus Park being able to generate a fair amount of revenue and basically pay for itself if not a little bit more. And the same with the Hotel Conference Center. You know, what we've learned is that tourism is a real thing, right? I mean, people come here. And when they do, they tend to spend some money, either whether it's a gas, or an ice cream cone or a night lodging or a meal. And so we want to be able to generate that kind of activity in our local economy. And promoting tourism is a great way to do that.
Unknown Speaker
Just a couple minutes left to any update from city council or things that are coming up announcements that we should know about. Joe,
Unknown Speaker
you have mentioned, we're the community of the year. I mean, the City of Columbus was named community of the Year by the Indiana chamber. And yeah, we had a big O announcement party Monday of last week. And there's going to be a formal announcement award ceremony in November. And yeah, we couldn't be more pleased. You know, we tell ourselves that we want to be an extraordinary community won't be the best community of our size in the country. And what was really kind of neat about this was that we didn't apply for this. I mean, with a lot of these awards, you have to nominate yourself, but we didn't do that. And so to be called out of the blue and told Yeah, we've picked you out of all the, you know, whatever the number is 120 Some communities in Indiana. Yeah, it was kind of special gives us a little validation, you know, that perhaps we weren't perhaps we're doing a few things. Right. You know, we talk about all the challenges and there are there are some but every now and then we get something right and I feel kind of happy for for the people in the community who've worked so hard to make Columbus up a welcoming and diverse place a safe community with great education for for kids. In great recreational opportunities for our residents. Yeah, it's it's a big pat on the back for everybody.
Unknown Speaker
Thank you so much for your time. We'll see you October. Take care
