Soap Lake passes ‘25 budget

SOAP LAKE – The Soap Lake City Council unanimously passed its 2025 budget during its Nov. 20 regular meeting. The city received help from Finance Director Jeff Valentine this year and Soap Lake Mayor Peter Sharp thinks the process went smoother this year. 

“I feel very strong and comfortable that we're going to be pulling ourselves out of a stigma that Soap Lake is broke,” Sharp said. “We're going to be really healthy this next year.” 

The City of Soap Lake does an overall budget instead of a line-item budget to allow for changes throughout the year to go towards necessary expenses. The budget the city passed does not determine exactly how the funds will be used, instead, it allocates funds to each function of the city.  

“Typically, people think about each individual item,” Sharp said. “This is a whole of what the city's budget is, coming in, revenue coming in, revenue going out. We're approving the budget. So then in the future that we have the ability to either update or amend it, to add certain things to it that, you know, maybe Public Works needs a new roof on their building, then we'll be able to see through a line item that, yes, it's allocated for it, yes, we can use it.” 

The money in each fund can be adjusted throughout the year by the council in order to fit the needs of the city. However, the budget does finalize the amount of money each fund will get for the year 2025. 

“We can do budget amendments also throughout the year,” Councilwoman Kayleen Bryson said during closing comments of the meeting. “Other jurisdictions sometimes do a half a dozen a year. So, there's a lot of fluidity in the budget. And now that we're getting it all figured out, I'm very excited.” 

The city has anticipated around $7.3 million in revenues among all of the funds in 2025. Expenditures have been estimated at around $4.7 million which leaves the city with around $2.6 million in excess for the 2025 fiscal year.  

“The budget is a skeleton of our funds,” Councilwoman Judith Gorman said. “But policy trumps the budget. The city council is responsible for establishing policy, and line items. We've been dinged for years by the audit, and so we've really put a lot of energy in this last year to get it right. We're getting our ducks in a row.” 

General Fund 

For 2025 the city is anticipating around $2.6 million in general fund revenues from taxes, licenses, permits, state-generated revenues, charges for services, fines and miscellaneous revenues.  

Soap Lake will have a general fund expenditure of around $2.02 million. The city will have a surplus of around $641,000 in the general fund.  

Street Fund 

The street fund will receive around $200,000 in revenues, with about $128,000 coming from the beginning balance. The rest will come from state-generated revenues, sale of scrap and junk equipment and a transfer from the Transportation Benefit District for $35,000. 

The total fund expenditures will be around $128,000 with a surplus of roughly  $73,000. The expenses predicted in the budget include maintenance projects such as street training, scrub seal engineering and labor and licensing. The city will also be paying for wages, benefits, supplies and street admin.  

Benevolent Fund 

The benevolent fund is used to help people and families in need. Soap Lake Police Chief Ryan Cox said in a previous story the fund used to be for strictly Shop with a Cop; however, the department now uses it to buy Thanksgiving meals, school supplies and other needs around the city. The fund has a beginning balance of around $5,000 and will have an additional $2,000 added to it from donations from private sources. This will put the fund at around $7,000.  

The budget only specifies around $800 worth of expenses for supplies which leaves around $6,200 in funds in the account.  

Stadium Tax

The stadium tax fund is used to provide events to the community. The fund has a revenue of around $157,000. The city plans on spending close to $45,000 with only $1,000 planned for repairs and maintenance, the rest will be for community events.  

The fund pays for events such as Run to the Desert, Suds and Sun – Fourth of July event, paddle races, Fourth of July Event hosted by SLPD and similar events that draw visitors to the city. There is also an additional $8,500 budgeted for utilities.  

Real Estate Excise

The real estate excise tax fund has an anticipated revenue of around $148,000 with no planned expenses. 

Transportation Benefit District 

The revenues expected for the Transportation Benefit District is around $50,000. The only expenses listed are insurance for $1,618 and a transfer out to the streets for $35,000. This totals roughly $36,600 in expenses which leaves around 14,000 in the account.  

 Capital Projects Fund and 2017 Limited Obligation Bond 

There is no anticipated additional revenue or expenses for these funds. The fund for Capital Projects is sitting at $2,267 and the 2017 Limited Obligation Bond is sitting at $10,847 with no listed changes. 

Water Fund and Solid Waste Fund 

The 2025 water fund has an anticipated revenue of around $1.3 million and planned expenditures of around $936,000. This is predicted to leave around $363,000 in the fund.  

The solid waste fund is predicted to receive around $513,000 in revenue with nearly $429,000 in expenses. This is anticipated to leave the fund balance at $84,000.  

Sewer Utility and Mineral Water 

The anticipated revenue for the sewer utility fund is around $2.1 million with a planned expenditure of $1.1 million. This will leave the fund at around $996,000.  

The mineral water fund has no planned expenditures or revenue which will leave the fund at the current balance of about $5,400. 

Sewer and water construction 

The sewer construction fund will have a transfer from the sewer utility fund for $175,000 which will leave the fund at around $1,300. There are no planned expenditures, however the account has a negative $173,704.  

The water construction fund has no planned expenditures or revenues which will keep the account at the current balance of around $111,000. 

Treasures Suspense Fund 

This fund has no planned expenditures; however, it will have an additional $315 added to it from state building surcharge collection leaving the account at around $1,600.