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Director Leininger then discussed the proposed budget for FY 2024 and reviewed some of the projects they have planned for the next year. He said that overall, aside from city-wide salary and benefit adjustments, the operating expenditures are flat from last year. He shared that they will be reclassifying an unfilled FT Project Specialist position to a Climate Action & Sustainability Coordinator position and that “Climate Action & Sustainability” will be added as a core service going forward. In response to a question from Vice President Kepple, Director Leininger went into more detail about the Waterfront Access Feasibility Study. He explained the original intention of the study was to understand and revisit some concepts that were contemplated as part of the original Lakewood Park Masterplan, which showed a pier coming off the eastern edge of the solstice steps. He said they are still in conversations about the direction of this project, but the goal is to at least get people to the edge of the water. Several councilmembers commented that the Planning Department does a lot of work for the small size of their department. In response to questions from Councilmember Bullock, Director Leininger and Assistant Director Leininger went into more detail about the financial and community benefits of transferring the operation of Winterhurst back to the city. Director Leininger explained that in the old model, the city assumed all the risk yet received no financial benefit. Assistant Director Baas said that so far, the transition has been a win-win and the biggest advantage for the city has been transparency since the previous operator shared no financial records. He said that currently the facility has been operating in the black, so when unplanned maintenance expenses arise, they can take care of it internally. Councilmember Baker commented that the community vision has not been updated since 2018 and asked whether that would be part of the impending code update or if the department had other plans for that. Director Leininger replied that Lakewood does not have a comprehensive plan,but the community vision serves as a guide to help plan the city’s path forward. He said there were recently some updates to the community vision and they are not currently planning any furtherupdates, but rather to use the community vision as a guiding document for the code update project. Councilmember Baker encouraged the department to think about updating the community vision next, as they are complementary projects but serve different purposes. *** Finance Department Budget Presentation Finance Director Rancatore started his presentation by providing an overview of the various divisions within the Finance Department, which include Administration (encompassing accounting, payroll, purchasing, and AP/AR), Tax (involving the collection of income taxes in- house at the Annex and property tax collection by Cuyahoga County), Vital Statistics (responsible for issuing/reissuing birth and death certificates), and Utility Billing (handling water and sewer billing as well as service initiation and termination). 8