ROCKWELL — Rockwell will be tightening its fiscal belt this upcoming year, as despite the growing costs that all governments are experiencing, the aldermen have stated that they will not raise the property tax rate.

“We also cannot go up on taxes, because we have the last few years and, believe me, our tax rate is already pretty high,” said Mayor Chuck Bowman.

Bowman said that the desire to keep the tax rate the same stems from the fact that the town has raised taxes two years in a row, raising the rate to $0.46 in 2023 and $0.55 per $100 of property valuation in 2024.

The mayor’s comment came after the hot-button issue on the agenda for the workshop, a discussion of the proposed budgets from both the Rockwell and Rockwell Rural fire departments. Rockwell Fire Chief Jereme Linker showed both, saying that he was asked to include the Rockwell Rural proposal by Bowman.

“We looked at the (Rockwell) Rural proposal, which they brought to us, no matter what people say on Facebook. I’ll say it’s real easy to look at the (Rockwell) Rural and say, ‘hey, we’ll save money.’ But, part of the problem is that we’ll have no control because it’s a county fire department that has their own charter,” said Bowman.

Alderman Dillon Brewer said that he was concerned that the town was considering a short-term solution that would hamper it in the long-term. He added that the town had hundreds of houses coming in multiple planned developments, and the tax revenue from those properties would alleviate some of the budget issues.

“When we talk about cutting our payroll or cutting employees who are working for department that has been around for 70 years, I would exhaust every opportunity, and if we have close to $3 million sitting in the bank, why don’t we start appropriating (items) that we can pay for out of the budget before we discuss the fire department,” said Brewer.

One thing the aldermen all agreed on was that the police department had been the focus of recent public safety expenditures, something that had left the fire department’s staffing lacking. Part of Linker’s presentation included a plan to improve the department’s ISO Fire Safety Rating, as the town received a Class 3 rating at its last evaluation in 2023.

Linker’s plan primarily focused on the categories where the department struggled the most in water supply, personnel training and availability of company personnel.

The water supply plan, where the town scored 27.39 out of 40 available points, including dividing the town into different districts. When fires occur in the districts with the least water supply, the department would automatically set up water shuttles for the incident.

Two low water supply areas of particular concern that Linker said the department needed to focus on were on Gold Hill Avenue in front of the former Sunshine Manufacturing building and Depot Street near Bethel Baptist Church.

For training, Linker said one of Rockwell’s new priorities would be utilizing other departments’ training more often and coordinating training with other departments, as well as making sure to hold personnel accountable for their internal training requirements.

Linker said that the town also needed to improve its score for both its average on-duty and on-call personnel. To do so, the proposed budget includes one new full-time firefighter, and Linker is applying for a FEMA grant that would pay another firefighter’s salary for four years.

To increase the department’s on-call hours, Linker also included a new benefit in the budget, which states that any firefighters who return for a structure fire call within the city limits get a minimum of three hours pay for part-time employees or 4.5 hours for full-time employees, providing more of an incentive for firefighters to respond to calls while not on duty.

Linker also stated that looking through the ISO ratings, the department would not need a new satellite station in the short- or medium-term, as the department is currently well under the expected response times of 320 seconds for the first engine on scene. That determination answered one of the aldermen’s main concerns that the town’s future developments would require an additional station.

As part of the discussion, Linker pointed out that Rockwell offers higher pay to part-timers as well as access to state pensions, both of which would be lost if firefighters moved to Rockwell Rural.

In other news from the meeting:

The aldermen discussed the budget for the town’s administration, including what the salaries would look like due to the upcoming retirement of long-time Town Clerk Marlene Dunn.

The town has offered a five percent annual increase in salaries in recent years, which includes a cost of living adjustment, longevity pay as well as an increase to keep the town competitive. The aldermen did not make a decision on what annual increase they would want to implement.

Dunn shared some uncertainty with the town’s budget stemming from two outside issues. The North Carolina League of Municipalities Health Benefits Trust will no longer be offering benefits. Rockwell employees received dental, vision, disability and life insurance from the NCLM. Dunn said that she is exploring other insurance options.

The other issue was that the N.C. Local Government Commission has not yet decided on the rates for local government’s contributions to retirement funds, which has historically been voted on in March. However, the LGC postponed the decision until late April, meaning that towns do not know what their contributions will be.

Public Works Director Chris Renfrow presented his budget requests to the board, with one of the largest items being the restoration of the parking lots at the Rockwell American Legion building. Renfrow’s budget included a $134,000 request for the project, but Mayor Pro Tem Chris Cranford noted that the aldermen could just do the upper parking lot to save tens of thousands of dollars during a difficult budget year.

The aldermen continued to discuss ways to reduce expenditures, including looking at capital projects that could be pushed down the road for a few years

At the end of the meeting, the board members voted to schedule another special meeting for April 8 at 2 p.m. to further discuss the fire department and budget plans.

“(The aldermen) are going to have a lot to think about after this meeting, because believe me, it’s not an easy job to figure out this budget,” said Bowman.