The City of East Peoria is a step closer to finalizing a working cash budget of close to $80 million for the upcoming fiscal year.
The city council on Monday unanimously approved a first reading of the spending plan that projects revenue at $76.9 million and expenses at slightly more than $79 million.
“It’s a balanced budget; the difference in those two numbers is the remainder of the police department building, which is being paid from bond proceeds. So those aren’t being paid out of the current year revenues,” said finance director Jeff Becker.
The council also passed its annual appropriations ordinance, in an amount of $114.5 million.
“The appropriations is the maximum amount that we can legally spend,” said commissioner Mark Hill. “There’s an Illinois law that requires us to ... have our appropriation in by the first quarter of the fiscal year, which we’re well ahead of that.”
The regular city council meeting was moved up one day from the normal schedule because new state law prohibits municipalities from holding meetings on the day of an election.
The council votes followed a public hearing at the outset of the meeting on both the proposed budget and the appropriations ordinance. No residents spoke during the hearing.
The 2027 projected revenue reflects an increase of about $3.5 million from the 2026 revised budget, while expenses are down around $20.3 million. The appropriations amount also represents a $20 million reduction from the current fiscal year.
“Two major things in reducing that this year. Our street department [spent] about $8 million due to the Springfield Road project last year, and then the reduction of $18 million due to the police department [building] from what was in there last year,” said Becker.
Formal adoption of the budget and appropriations ordinance is set for the April 7 city council meeting, with the new fiscal year starting May 1.
Among other actions taken during the meeting, the council approved spending about $210,000 on pipe and other materials needed to replace a water main on Arnold Road; buying a new backhoe for the water department at a cost of around $158,000; purchasing two Livescan fingerprinting systems for the new police headquarters; and a series of resolutions related to the city’s group health insurance plan.
