FISCAL responsibility

According to the Financial Statements Audit Report and Supplemental Compliance Report, both filed by the Indiana State Board of Accounts on June 23, 2025, covering January 2020 through December 2024, Long Beach's General Fund has steadily grown - that's real strength, and it's something to build on.

But the same audit shows our Town's savings account — the Rainy-Day Fund — tells a different story. It held $103,970 as of the 2024 audit. That's 6.6% of the $1,576,911 the Town spent from its General Fund that year. Indiana's own state guidance calls for a 15% minimum. The standard used by national credit rating agencies for a top-tier municipality is 25–35%. A stronger reserve isn't just a number on a spreadsheet. It's what lets a town absorb a bad year, an emergency repair, or an unexpected legal cost.

The Benchmarks That Matter

• Accelerate Indiana Municipalities (AIM) / Indiana Department of Local Government Finance, City and Town Budget Bulletin — the state's 15% minimum operating balance guidance. 

• Government Finance Officers Association, Fund Balance Guidelines for the General Fund — the national ~17% (two-month) minimum. 

• Moody's Investors Service, US Cities and Counties rating methodology (July 2024) — sets the 25–35% "Aaa" reserve benchmark cited above. 

Most budgets treat savings as whatever is left over at the end of the year. That's backwards. My plan flips it: the reserve gets funded first, before any new discretionary spending is approved — every single year, without exception.  Running the numbers backward from a four-year timeline to reach the top of the national benchmark (35% of revenue) produces a clear, fixed target.  

The Town of Long Beach already has the legal authority to fund this.  This plan requires commitment, discipline, and follow-through.  In a typical year, this plan doesn't require cutting anything — the Town's own recent surplus history, per the same audit, covers it with room to spare. But if the Town has a genuinely lean year — 2022 was the leanest on record, per the audit, with the General Fund growing just $11,592 that year — the plan calls for delaying non-urgent purchases for a single cycle, not touching essential services.

In a few short years, Long Beach can move from the bottom of the reserve rankings to the top of the national standard.  That's what fiscal responsibility looks like: a plan you can check, with numbers you can verify, and a Council that's accountable to it every year.