ASHEBORO – The Asheboro City Council approved its 2025-26 operating budget, which is balanced at about $75.7 million, at its June meeting.
Of that, the general fund is balanced at approximately $50.5 million, which is approximately a $2 million increase from the prior year, mostly due to personnel expenses, city manager Donald Duncan said.
“We’re going to do a base pay increase for every full-time employee of $2,000, except for fire and police, who are getting a $3,000 increase because that is where our biggest deficit is in trying to recruit and keep good talent,” Duncan said.
Essentially half of the total budget is going toward public safety (police, fire and inspections).
“Developing talented police officers and ensuring public safety is very important,” Duncan said.
The city is also committing $7.35 million to culture and recreational services, including more than $3 million for facility maintenance.
“The City of Asheboro prides itself on its culture and recreation services, but most important is facilities maintenance,” Duncan said. “You have over half a million square feet to maintain. There’s a lot to do and we do a very good job with it.”
Other budget highlights include $1.3 million for debt services, $500,000 for 4.85 miles of street resurfacing, $700,000 for street lighting, $160,000 for sidewalk construction and $250,000 for local community agency support.
In addition, the city will maintain its property tax rate of $0.71 per $100 valuation.
The council also held a public hearing for a rezoning request for approximately 0.7 acres of property located 619 Albemarle Road from a split zoning with Medium-Density Residential to only General Commercial for the purpose of constructing a commercial activities center.
Following the hearing, the council approved the request.
The council also approved an agreement with Norfolk Southern Railway Company in relation to the Pineview Street Project.
“The agreement is for the proposed installation of an eight-inch DIP sanitary sewer line encased in a 16-inch casing on Pineview Street,” city engineer Michael Leonard said.
Finally, the council approved two water resource projects: accepting the funding for the Lake Lucas Dam intake replacement project and an amendment to the design-build contract for the Wolfspeed water main extension project.
“The state allocated to the City of Asheboro $4,170,500 and that was to be used for water or wastewater infrastructure projects,” water resources director Michael Rhoney said. “We’ve been working on this for a while and finally received a letter of intent to fund from the Division of Water Infrastructure on May 13 of this year.”
The amendment establishes the new GMP for a total contract value for the Wolfspeed contract is now just under $51,750,000.
“GMP4 is the final design for everything and engineering services during construction for section 2 and project reconciliation, which is basically the risk register for the contingency,” Rhoney said. “Once again, it’s state money and we’re not on the dime for it.”
The Asheboro City Council will next meet July 10.
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