The Vashon Park District continues to meet its operating targets and expenses as it heads into 2019 with a balanced budget, though an election for a levy in the new year may affect the district’s goals.

The district approved its 2019 budget, a $1.3 million spending plan, in November. It will receive an $8,000 increase in levy funds next year and carry over $475,000 from this year.

Executive Director Elaine Ott-Rocheford characterized the budget as not having changed much from this year, save for restructuring in some of the budget categories, but new commitments the district made this year will guide its spending. Those include an incremental staff wage increase approved earlier last June, the expansion of recreation programming and beginning work on a list of deferred maintenance projects in accordance with a major strategic plan. The district’s 2019 budget allocates $145,000 for capital projects per the plan, which commissioners approved in November. Most of the other spending categories in the budget are similar to last year.

As part of the commons agreement with the school district for community use of school facilities, the park district will pay $74,000, up $16,000 from this year. Administration needs will cost $357,000, up $17,000 from 2018. One of the biggest budget increases is for programs, which now stands at $221,000. The park district has committed to providing $100,000 for programming in 2019, an objective Ott-Rocheford has said will depend on levy dollars. Finally, the district is poised to pay less toward bonds and loans, from $54,000 in 2018 to $30,000 next year.

Maintenance is still the largest expense in the budget at $544,317. The pool summer budget is higher at $104,306, but the winter budget is lower, at just under $38,000. Ott-Rocheford attributed those figures to unanticipated costs that can affect either season, such as the bulk purchase of supplies or repairs and education costs for training and certifying lifeguards.

The district ended 2018 with $32,000 in its operating reserve, $310,000 in its permanent reserve and $103,000 in its capital reserve. Its former operating reserve was eliminated as a budget category for 2019 and instead folded into the existing capital reserve, as was recommended by the state auditor’s office.

Earlier this month, the state auditor’s office determined the district is in good financial standing, news that was welcomed by the commissioners. The annual state accountability audit determined that in all examined areas from 2016 to 2017, the district “complied with applicable state laws, regulations, and its own policies, and provided adequate controls over the safeguarding of public resources.” In past years the district has faced criticism for its financial decisions both from islanders and in previous audits, but Ott-Rocheford said it was a joint effort of former and current commissioners who got the district back on track.

“It was about the board’s development of policies that managed our cash flow appropriately and created the reserves, and then the rest of it is how the staff managed it,” she said, crediting good governance for the district’s success. “It was absolutely a team effort, and everyone should be incredibly proud.”

She added that the state has moved the district back to a three-year auditing cycle as opposed to a yearly cycle, as the district has been reviewed in recent times because confidence is restored in the district’s overall management.

One of the district’s preeminent financial controls was adjusted last month as commissioners voted to relax the financial management policy stipulating how its budgeted reserves must act. Under the old policy, the district had to prioritize funding its reserves over needs elsewhere, such as for supporting programming or completing capital improvement work. Ott-Rocheford has said in discussions of the matter that without changing the policy, the district would have eventually over-allocated funds to its reserves and that the old policy no longer served the district’s needs.

After a vote last month, commissioners changed the policy to better allocate levy dollars from property taxes for its purposes once the reserves for programming and deferred maintenance are considered adequately funded.

Concerns of chair Doug Ostrom about cash flow prompted Ott-Rocheford to reiterate, as she has at past board meetings, that the district will be in a fine — if lean — position into the first months of 2020 no matter what it asks for in the upcoming levy election. Its permanent reserve, which supports both programming and the salary increases, will end 2019 with less money than it started with. But Ott-Rocheford said that was the intention.

“It’s not that we’re budgeting to end the year with more money — we’re not,” she said, emphasizing that the financial management policy was revised in order to meet the district’s new priorities. “The permanent reserve is lower because of our commitment to recreation programming and salary increases. In order to do what the board felt was necessary to do and the commitment to the public and the commitment to the staff, the permanent reserve is lower than last year.”

Ott-Rocheford added that what the district asks for in the upcoming levy election will determine how it will get through 2020.

By law, the district is subject to a 1 percent increase of levy dollars over what it received the previous year. Vashon is currently voter-approved at a .50 cent levy per $1,000 of assessed property value, but the district is not able to levy commensurate with the steady rise of property values on the island, which has increased in recent years. Ott-Rocheford said that it is “a safe assumption” the district will not ask islanders to vote for a lower levy in the election. Should the current .50 cent levy be maintained, she noted, it would likely prevent the district from completing its anticipated deferred maintenance projects.

“At .50 cents, unless we change our commitment to the strategic plan and the capital projects that we’re planning on doing, we would have to borrow, and that is just not something this board is willing to do,” she said.

The board has not yet made a determination on the rate it will ask islanders to vote on.

Commissioner Ostrom said that he remembers in 2015 when islanders barely approved the district’s current .50 cent levy. He is concerned that voters will feel some fatigue on account of recent, higher levies approved for the fire and school districts.

“That’s an important memory for me because we were really on pins and needles waiting to see if it would pass,” he said.

While he is confident in the park district’s 2019 budget, he said that he will continue to advocate for cautious spending as wages and costs continue to rise and the district approaches the levy election.

“It’s a responsible budget — I don’t want to suggest that it isn’t — but it’s just a question of being conservative or very conservative for expenses,” he said.