News
State Treasurer report: Ypsi is fiscally OK
by: Steve Pierce, YpsiNews.com - Filed Under News | Email | Print |
(May 5, 2008) According to a recent study by the Michigan Department of Treasury, Ypsilanti is not on a watch list of troubled communities.
Far from it. Ypsilanti scores very well, garnering a 2 out of 10. A lower number indicates lower risk. A score of 0 reflects the presence of neutral fiscal health and a score of 8 or above reflects a local unit experiencing fiscal stress.
That is a good news for the City as it prepares for a new budget this month.
According to the state, Ypsilanti was above average in fiscal stability scoring a 2.
The average score for Michigan cities was 2.4 for the fiscal year ending in 2006. The Department scored 269 of the 274 cities for which information was available. The breakdown for each numeric category is listed below:
0 to 4 Fiscally Neutral
5 to 7 Watch List
8 to 10 Fiscal Stress
Key factors from nine categories are analyzed and assigned points. They include, but are not limited to:
1. Population growth
2. Real taxable valuation growth
3. Large real taxable value decrease
4. General fund expenditures as a percent of taxable valuation
5. General fund operating deficits
6. Prior general fund operating deficits
7. Size of general fund balance
8. Fund deficits in current or previous years
9. General long-term debt as a percent of taxable value
Ypsilanti got 0’s (best score) in all but two categories, population decline and Debt Ratio. Since 2000, Ypsilanti’s population dropped by 619 residents. SEMCOG is predicting that by 2035, Ypsilanti will lose less than 100 residents over a 30 year period or a 0.4% drop.
By comparison Ann Arbor scored a 1, Saline was 0, and Chelsea was 3. Outside the County, Highland Park and River Rouge both scored 8, Hamtramck was a 7, and Pontiac and Belleville scored a 5. Last week, Pontiac has recently been placed under supervision by Governor Granholm pending a 60 day review by financial experts appointed by the State.
View Ypsilanti’s Report
View Fiscal Indicators Scores for other Cities
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3 Responses to “State Treasurer report: Ypsi is fiscally OK”
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Hmmmm. Back when we were talking about that silly city income tax thing, supporters of the new tax were saying that our insurance rates would go up because our risk assessment would worsen.
This doesn’t mean that all that talk was just a bunch of bullshit, does it?
Trusty,
Don’t you remember, the city had a $1.3 million surplus but they didn’t release those numbers until after the City Income tax election in November.
- Steve
I’m still amazed that anyone thought the tax was a good thing.
Smoke and mirrors to push a particular point of view is nothing new in politics, but as far as I can tell, there was no particular advantage to the tax proposal.
Anyway, that is history, and I hope the City can get it through its head that it can cope if its prepared to be creative.