FY2023 Budget

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Thank you for your participation.  The Missoula City Council adopted the FY23 budget on August 22, 2022. You can read a summary of the budget in the news section below or view the budget details on our primary website.

Mayor John Engen presented his budget recommendations for Fiscal Year 2023 on June 29. Through August, the City Council will review specific budget items and make changes, then adopt a final budget. You can view the mayor's budget recommendations, follow changes requested by the City Council, and comment on budget proposals on this page.

Budget Goals

The City’s strategic plan outlines guiding principles and specific goals. These principles inform our budget decisions. Mayor Engen's focused goals for FY23 include the following:

  • Achieve organizational excellence
    • Develop a plan that works to recruit and retain an engaged, innovative and diverse staff at

Mayor John Engen presented his budget recommendations for Fiscal Year 2023 on June 29. Through August, the City Council will review specific budget items and make changes, then adopt a final budget. You can view the mayor's budget recommendations, follow changes requested by the City Council, and comment on budget proposals on this page.

Budget Goals

The City’s strategic plan outlines guiding principles and specific goals. These principles inform our budget decisions. Mayor Engen's focused goals for FY23 include the following:

  • Achieve organizational excellence
    • Develop a plan that works to recruit and retain an engaged, innovative and diverse staff at all levels
    • Take formal steps to ensure the long-term financial sustainability of the City’s General Fund
    • Build a comprehensive plan to address systemic racism and inequality that may be embedded within city policies, procedures and systems
    • Implement and leverage new technology to improve collaboration, communication and project management
    • Expand capacity and use of Results Management
    • Advance our communications approach
    • Plan for the City government’s capacity and infrastructure needs through a facilities master plan
  • Access to quality housing
    • Purchase land and partner with the private sector on innovative new development models
    • Adopt a program to incentivize the creation of affordable homes
    • Innovate and align the City’s regulatory codes to better support our housing goals
  • Invest in community safety and wellness
    • Support policing practices that result in the best service and public safety to our community and that prioritize professionalism, accountability and efficiency
    • Invest in community services that support working families and provide a place for connection, including the expansion of our child care programs and community centers
    • Continue to find opportunities and funding sources to support Missoula Promise, the community’s program to fund 2-year higher education for Missoulians
    • Invest in programs to serve our most vulnerable residents
    • Enhance Alternate Response Unit capacity to ensure the Fire Department maintains its response time targets as Missoula rapidly grows
  • Invest in our built and natural environment
    • Create a decision-making framework to consider climate and resiliency through the City’s Climate Strategic Initiative Work Team
    • Implement reforestation projected as funded by 2018 Open Space Bond and grants
    • Continue investment in infrastructure in the Mullan Road area through the successful implementation of the Mullan BUILD Project and Sxwtpqyen Master Plan, including a system of parks and trails to meet residents’ needs
    • Invest in infrastructure planning and design development to support development in the North Reserve Scott Street URD
    • Complete the Rattlesnake Dam Restoration project
    • Complete the Waterworks Hill Trailhead and invest in other universal access trail improvements
    • Support parks and trails infrastructure projects
    • Continue to implement the neighborhood traffic management program and prioritize investments in safety, accessibility and alternative modes of transportation
    • Identify projects and prepare grant materials to take advantage of federal funding opportunities that will help the City achieve its goals
    • Complete solar installation at the Wastewater Resource Recovery Facility that will offset the demand of more than 20% of the main electrical feed to the plant

Revenue

Property Taxes

Our primary source of funding for most of our work is property taxes. The City of Missoula held mills steady during the pandemic. This budget adds about $44.75 in property taxes and assessments annually for every $100,000 in assessed value. This translates to about $11/month for a typical Missoula house. Remember that assessed value does not equate to true market value. Missoula County’s website can provide you easy access to your home’s assessed value where you can see how this increase would apply to you.

American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA)

The City will receive our remaining allocation, $7.1 million, from this federal program in FY23. ARPA funds give us the opportunity to address housing inventory and affordability, expand programs to prevent and ease homelessness, support residents experiencing behavioral health crises, shore up our rainy-day fund, stockpile essential personal protective equipment, and support businesses and commercial development.

Staying Informed

We have several ways for you to find information about our annual budget. This site will have regular budget updates in the news feed below. In-depth budget documents will be on our main website.

  • Subscribe to this project using the button to the right.
  • Visit this page and read the updates in the news feed.
  • Find detailed documents on our main website. Documents are added each Wednesday for the items to be discussed at that week's City Council Budget and Finance Committee meetings.
  • View budget committee meeting agendas, minutes, and videos on our website.

Getting Involved

You can leave budget comments in several ways. Please note that all comments are public record.

  • Ask us a question in the Q&A below. The question and answer will be posted publicly with your user name.
  • Submit comments via our feedback form below. Comments will be included in the City Council’s meeting packet each week.
  • Comment directly on the meeting agenda. When agendas are posted on the City’s main website on Friday afternoons, they include a place for the public to submit comments. Sign up to receive the City Council agendas and committee schedules in your inbox.
  • Participate in meetings. Each meeting has a public comment period, and participation instructions are included in the agendas.

Thank you for your participation.  The Missoula City Council adopted the FY23 budget on August 22, 2022. You can read a summary of the budget in the news section below or view the budget details on our primary website.

  • Budget Summary

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    Members of the Missoula City Council passed the City’s budget for the new fiscal year with few amendments.

    In an extraordinarily tight budget year, this budget preserves services that Missoula residents need and want – fire protection, police services, street maintenance, clean and safe public parks, an abundant supply of drinking water, help for Missoula’s less fortunate residents and people in crisis and more. It also funds a few relatively newer services, such as the Mobile Support Team, which responds to people experiencing mental and behavioral health emergencies in the community.

    The $276 million budget also provides $546,000 for a code reform project that aims to update and simplify City codes to facilitate new housing construction; $250,000 to support the City’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund; $964,000 for Operation Shelter initiatives, which provide services for people experiencing homelessness; a $479,000 loan to support architectural design and infrastructure construction on the Scott Street housing project, the largest affordable home ownership project in state history; and $75,000 for statewide advocacy and coalition-building for the 100% Clean Energy project.

    The budget also makes significant infrastructure investments, including maintaining the City’s commitments to water system improvements totaling $19 million. The City is investing $10.3 million in its wastewater utility, including the largest non-export solar project in the state at the Wastewater Treatment Plant as a step toward accomplishing City climate goals. And the City has begun the Mullan Road area $23 million BUILD grant project that will improve the transportation network and provide for housing opportunities and enable the implementation of the Sxwtpqyen area master plan.

    “If we had more resources, we’d be doing a lot more in a lot more areas,” Acting Mayor Gwen Jones said. “But we have limited resources, so we have to prioritize, and this year it is maintaining service levels and making sure our employees are paid enough so that we can retain them and honoring out collective bargaining agreements. Other than that, there’s not a lot of new things funded in this budget.”

    This year’s budget requires an increase to City taxes of about 11.6 percent, adding about $44.99 per $100,000 of assessed value of a home. The state-assessed value differs from a home’s market value, running at about half of market value. City taxes are 30.4 percent of a property’s tax bill. Visit Missoula County iTax to research your tax bill.

    City levies usually increase a few percentage points per year. During the past two budget years during the pandemic, the City reduced City levies by 0.02 percent last year and 0.23 percent the year before. In addition, inflation is a continuing challenge for the City, showing up in areas like fuel and labor costs.

    For detailed information about the new budget, visit the City’s budget web page.