Marysville officials presented the city’s finance committee Thursday night with the results of a State of Ohio report of the city’s finances in 2016.
There are 17 areas that are rated to be positive, cautionary or critical. For Marysville’s 2016 financial report, four of those areas were rated cautionary, with the rest being positive.
“It’s a good thing to have, but the core analytics aren’t as reliable,” Finance Director Justin Nahvi said.
Nahvi gave an example of one area that changed from positive to cautionary from 2015 to 2016 was the result of the city’s real estate revenue falling by about $26,000, which is more than the one percent benchmark.
“Our real estate revenue went to 1.9 percent,” he said. “Realistically, that doesn’t make any (difference).”
In an interview with the Journal-Tribune, Nahvi said that number actually rose by $130,000 in 2017. He said it’s normal for that number to “vary marginally” year to year, with reappraisals or delinquent taxes coming into play.
Committee member Henk Berbee said the thought behind the rating was to get local councils to take a closer look at their money. If the ratings get a city to look at its money, the report is doing its job.
Nahvi also noted there’s no “wiggle room” in the ratios. Another field Marysville was “cautionary” on was the condition of its capital assets, like computers or vehicles. The rating comes from the city seemingly putting off replacing those assets.
Nahvi, however, said the rating doesn’t take into account the money the city continually puts in its capital budget to cover future purchases.
“I’d bet you a majority of municipalities are at a cautionary outlook for capital assets,” he said.
Officials said the fact these reports are so objective while only taking into account specific parts of the budget individually mean the city gets results it can’t do much with.
“I understand the purpose,” Nahvi told the Journal-Tribune. “But sometimes these items aren’t especially helpful.”
Another area that has the cautionary tag is the ratio of money the city owes against all other money. That percentage actually improved from critical to cautionary in 2015, and slightly improved further in 2016.
Finally, the city received a cautionary rating on the amount of money it has that isn’t tied to any particular fund or pending transaction. It dipped by about $2 million in 2016. Nahvi said he hasn’t finished the 2017 financial report yet, but expects that number to have jumped back up at least another $2 million.
Nahvi said he tasked Bill LaFayette, an economist with the Columbus-based Regionomics, with evaluating Marysville’s financial situation. LaFayette is completing the evaluation as part of a comprehensive plan officials are working on.
“He simply said the city’s in excellent financial shape,” Nahvi said. “He said we went through a rough patch during the recession, but we’ve come out of it well, and we’re managing our finances well.”
Nahvi said for the past few years, the Ohio State Auditor’s office runs the annual financial reports for municipalities through a computer program and rates them.
“All the software is doing is running our data and making financial ratios off of it,” he said.