12 December 2009 Gem Lake News - Laserfiche WebLink

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December, 2009 Volume 3, Issue 12 Gem Lake News Special Interest Articles: • Free Water Testing Program - See page 4 • The Highway 61 Make-over that Changed Gem Lake • Single Sort Recycling Comes to Gem Lake Upcoming Recycling Dates: December 30 January 13 January 27 Gretchen Artig-Swomley, Newsletter Editor Gem Lake's 2010 Final Budget, as approved at the November 17 City Council Meeting, produced some welcome good news as compared to the preliminary budget. Due to cost cutting and budget reallocations, the city has been able to reduce the 2010 Property Tax Levy from $443,289, as listed in the preliminary budget, to $395,828 in the final budget for next year. In addition to this reduction from preliminary to final budgets, the 2010 property Good News on 2010 Gem Lake Budget The Highway Make-Over that Changed Gem Lake Today’s modern highways follow a pattern of generally straight lines and gentle curves. Not so, before the Eisenhower Era focus on Interstate Highways and suburban growth. In the early 1950’s, Gem Lake’s portion of the transportation system looked pretty much like any other rural suburb at the time. Lazy country roads skirted along the edge of existing property lines, even when that meant a highway would zig-zag across the landscape, instead of following more efficient (and safer) straighter lines. As it tax levy is also down by 10.71% from 2009. The final general operating fund budget of $401,087 budget is a 16.7% decrease from 2009. It is also down from the 2010 the preliminary general operating fund budget proposed several months ago. The general fund budget makes up 65.34% of the total city budget and covers the operations of the city. This includes police, fire, road maintenance, snow removal, city hall ran through Gem Lake, Highway 61 flowed in front of the White Bear Floral Shop, made a sharp turn east, then turned again to the north at the location of the present day Stadium Bar (now Hoffman Road), and then curved again as it crossed over the existing railroad bed. It then followed the route of current day Hoffman Road, all the way up to the area of the old White Bear Township Hall. Clearly this “patchwork quilt” highway was a prime (continued on page 2) expenses, elections, council and meeting costs, etc. The major source of revenue for this fund (over 85%) is property taxes. Other pieces of the pie that together form the entire city budget of $613,876 include the Debt Service Fund, which pays for the cost of building Heritage Hall (24.56% of the budget); and the Enterprise Fund, (continued on page 5)