Ferry Street News City of Dayton, Oregon Quarterly Newsletter
June, July, August 2022
Photo Credit: John Collins
Photo Credit - John Collins
Town Talk with the Mayor The role of our city council, like most, is defined by our charter. Some of our most important responsibilities include recruiting, training, and retaining talented staff and managing our city budget. This time of the year, these critical duties are rolled together as our incredible staff carefully prepare and present a suggested budget before our citizen committee works with our elected council to finalize the official budget. Dayton has a very tight budget, collecting only $1.71 per $1000 of assessed value for our general operations. Comparatively, in Amity $3.61 is collected, Carlton collects $5.31, Willamina is at $4.21, Yamhill taxes at $3.74, and Lafayette at $4.24. Even including our public safety levy, the total rate is $3.56. Our city operates on much less than any of our neighboring small cities - and we do so with cost-saving efficiencies, carefully negotiated service agreements, and making tough decisions while taking a conservative approach to spending to protect some reserves. So what do you get for that $1.71/$1000 that you pay in annual property taxes? And how does the rest of the budget look? The City of Dayton tax dollars support our small professional staff: In this Issue DCDA Update Historical Highlight School Superintendent Update Columna de noticias en espanol DHS Class of 2022 Senior Photos Dayton Fire Update BBQ Chicken Dinner Info
- A City Manager who implements Council decisions, hires and supervises all other staff, prepares the budget, advises the Council, promotes collaborative relationships in the region and state, and manages projects and grants; - A City Recorder who ensures transparency by creating and keeping all legal records of meetings, ordinances, and code updates and also serves as our elections official; - A Public Works department who manages our fresh water and sewer systems, maintains our parks and public spaces, carries out street sweeping and other right of way maintenance, and responds to infrastructure emergencies; - A (part-time) Library Director who manages all library materials, programs, and projects as well as planning activities for city building; - Office staff who carry out accounting functions, facility rentals, permitting, code enforcement, and office duties like answering questions from residents, taking utility payments, and sharing communications from other departments;
Code Enforcement Corner
- We also have service contacts for our attorney, land use planner, and engineer so we only pay them when we need to use them.
Summer Reading Program
- The public safety levy ($1.85/$1000) adds one full-time patrol deputy to provide policing - without this we would have only occasional coverage via county rural patrol,
Old Timers Weekend Event Info
(Continued on page 4)