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5/10/2017 Kalispell 2018 preliminary budget sees $12 million increase NBC Montana http://www.nbcmontana.com/news/kcfw/kalispell2018preliminarybudgetsees12millionincrease1/490414777 1/2 Kalispell 2018 preliminary budget sees $12 million increase By: Christopher Salas Posted: May 09, 2017 08:42 PM MDT Updated: May 09, 2017 10:36 PM MDT KALISPELL, Mont. The city of Kalispell's preliminary budget for fiscal year 2018 has an increase of about $12 million from last year and $30 million compared to 2016. Property owners like Dale Cordell showed concern over the figures. "$12 million is an awful lot of money to be raising any kind of a budget," says Cordell. "I don't know how they can justify it." Kalispell City Manager Doug Russell said the increase is due to a number of projects around the city. "We have a capital improvement plan just for this year alone at $20 million, but we have problems that are outside of that that are capital improvements," Russell said. Projects in the capital improvement plan include fixing nearly 100yearold water mains on Third and Fourth Avenue while rebuilding those streets to allow twoway traffic. Then there's continuing work to remove the old railroad tracks from downtown and redevelopment of the CORE area. Despite the plans Russell told NBC Montana property taxes will not go up. Kalispell 2018 preliminary budget... ---PAGE BREAK--- 5/10/2017 Kalispell 2018 preliminary budget sees $12 million increase NBC Montana http://www.nbcmontana.com/news/kcfw/kalispell2018preliminarybudgetsees12millionincrease1/490414777 2/2 "Projects have been planned and accounted for coming up to this point, so it won't really have an impact from these projects on anyone's rates, assessments or anything of that nature," Russell said. Russell says a collection of federal and state grants are helping pay for the projects. A large percentage of the increase comes from a $10 million federal TIGER grant. The city also received a $1.5 million state grant for the Kidsports Complex. The general fund is budgeted at $11.4 million for next year. That's nearly a 5percent increase from last year. The city also expects to see a 1.8percent increase in health care after last year's 7percent jump. Russell said he expects council to wrap up budget work sessions Wednesday night but will work Thursday if they have to. © Copyright 2017 by KECI, KCFW, KTVM. All rights reserved. This material ma