The city’s annual budget was unanimously approved Monday night. The city has big plans ahead for its next fiscal year and took a moment during the commission meeting to reflect on all they’ve accomplished over the past 12 months and discuss their hopes for the future of the city.
In what was arguably one of its most impressive feats, the city spent approximately $7.2 million paving 51 streets. In total it was about 27 miles and required 46,866 tons of asphalt to complete the project. During the paving, the city was able to tackle $3.8 million of corresponding water and sewer repairs.
“All 28 years that I’ve been up here, this is the best time of the year, this is the best moment,” Commissioner Mike Sparkman said. “There has been so much work put in during the year by our staff and by this commission as we come to this point of approving and accepting and launching next year’s budget. It’s so rewarding and refreshing to get that behind us… We have a lot to be proud for and proud of.”
Plant City Police Department tackled 94,300 calls for service and the Plant City Fire Department responded to
3,777 EMS calls and 108 fire calls. It broke ground on Fire Station Three, finalized the design of the incoming recreation center and won numerous awards.
The plans for the next year seem just as ambitious. Fire Station Three is set to be completed in nine to 12 months, the city is hiring a communications media management team, the city may soon be expanding utilities to State Road 39 to set the stage for potential development and it plans to pave approximately 13 more miles of roads.
Several of the local Recreation and Parks facilities will be getting upgrades or new structures and several major parking lots will be improved and resurfaced. McDaniel said the city is “filling in holes” to help move Plant City toward the perfect place to live, work and play.
“In the next five years I expect us to obviously see a lot of roads resurfaced, our utilities brought up to par, downtown thriving, sports village moving forward, midtown thriving, those are some of the key points,” McDaniel said.
The improvements downtown are the city’s way to help reenergize the historic district. He said making it more attractive by day and more inviting by night will help drive more people to the blossoming downtown, which in turn will only benefit local restaurants and businesses.
McDaniel is also working on making the city as “future oriented” as possible. The upcoming budget will help the city establish online permitting and he said they are also working on a one-touch customer service plan.
“You will see hopefully a much more effective city organization as far as all of that, services, facilities improved,” McDaniel said. “We’re making what appear to be small investments, like the restrooms in Brewer Park, but you know there’s a situation where you have on of the most used park facilities in our city and there are
no comfort facilities available. We’re going in and filling in holes like that and I expect that we would continue over the next several years.”