The City budget is in for the coming year in Stanley Wisconsin, and included in the numbers are forward-leaning costs for the City Shop on Pine Street, the Eighth Avenue Bridge, and Street Machinery, among other expenses. After fluctuating between $151,566.18 and $595,211.04 in yearly expenses from 2017 to 2020, the cost outlay for 2021 projects is registered as $2,256,086.71—wowsers!

Or maybe not. It turns out there’s a perfectly good explanation for the grand cost spike—three of them actually. First up though, bricks in the shop wall!

Previously determined to be in need of repair lest it topple to the ground, wall repairs at the City Shop are slated for $77,736.82, the same cost outlay as the year before. While the costs for 2021 are specifically slated for “wall repair,” that doesn’t mean past years were without their cost needs. Starting out the year of 2017, zero dollars were budgeted while a total $382.50 in actual dollars were spent on shop outlay, while that figure jumped to $140,581.45 in outlay and $14,367 in actual spending at the shop for 2018. Going into 2019, the budget figure was $108,868, while the actual spending was $1,076, coming in ‘under budget’ if looking at the glass as half-full. That being the case, the 2020 budget included $77,736.72 in shop outlays, while the actual expenditures came out to $0 at the shop, the same figure rolled into the present budget. From the shop wall we turn to law enforcement, where the upcoming police addition with planned administration by the City of Stanley reaching an outlay of $400,000 for 2021, also matching the 2020 budget while significantly above past years. How far above? Try $291, 761.98 if compared to the 2019 budget, though actual spending came in under projections.

Starting out in 2017, there were $0 budgeted for police department outlay, with the same for 2018, actual spending matching outlay numbers. For 2019 meanwhile, the actual spending on police outlay came out $53,821.79 under the budgeted figure at $54,416.23, with spending for 2020 coming out at $37,993.27 after a budgeted outlay of $400,000 for the year. With 2021 spending still up in the air as to actual figures, the police addition is set to be a handsome addition to the current City Hall at 353 South Broadway, and bidding still to be let. Regarding the police addition, a note on the outlay budget sheet notes that the full cost is to be financed with $215,000 in 2018 bond proceeds for the building shell with the balance to be paid for in carry over from city land sales. That being taken out of the way, what of fire department outlay?

Flat for the upcoming year. After budgeting $100,000 in potential outlays for 2017 and the year following, 2017 actual spending on fire department outlays totaled $44,856.61, with actual spending in 2018 coming out to $63,987.18, or $36,012.82 below the official budget figure. Meanwhile for 2019, the budgeted and actual spending figure match at a flat $213,506.57, the “Roof” being specified, with 2020 and 2021 registering $0 in fire department outlays. If you thought that was all though, there’s the streets outlay budget!

Set to bridge the Wolf River at Eighth Avenue westbound, the replacement for the currently closed bridge span on the north end of Chapman Lake has a budgeted outlay for 2021 of $360,000, with $104,000 budgeted for 2020 and $360,000 in 2019. Going further back the streets outlay budget prior to the bridge project was budgeted at $200,000 in 2018 and $80,599.65 in 2017.

Flipping the equation to go forward again, the actual spending for streets outlay in 2017 was $106,327.07, while for 2018 the actual streets outlay spending was $32,366.76, or just under $26,000 above the budgeted outlay for 2017 and $177,000 BELOW the budgeted streets outlay for 2018. In 2019, the budgeted versus actual resulted in a total of $157,421.31 BELOW the budgeted outlay figure, coming out to $202,579.69. Meanwhile in 2020, the current actual spending as of the budget was registered at $76,288.27, with a projected year-end total of $104,000 of $104,000 for the 2020 budget. Stay tuned for the bridge to come!

After streets comes street machinery, which saw a rise of $10,500 in budgeted outlay for 2021 as compared with 2020. All told, the outlay for 2021 Street Machinery is budgeted for $56,500 in purchases, while the 2019 budget cycle saw an actual spending figure that was $7,574 BELOW projections, coming out to $86,826 for 2019. The budgeted outlay in street machinery for 2018 matched the actual spending at $110,000, while the figure for both was $0 in 2017.

Last but not least is Parks and Playground outlay, which is projected at year end in 2020 to be 1,510,000, which figure influenced by the Community Center project is set at $1,361,850 in project outlay for 2021. It need be stated that $1,510,000 is tied to the originally projected cost of the Community Center and does not therefore represent an additional $1.51 million in City spending. The cost to the City for the Community Center after grant and insurance is slated to be $261,850, or roughly $113,850 above the original as determined by an inflation-adjusted figure of $148,000 for 1973, not counting spikes in lumber cost.