LORAIN — With about seven weeks left in the year, Lorain Municipal Court collection fees for Lorain’s general fund are nearly $571,000 less than the $1.41 million revenue city officials budgeted for.
Annual revenue from collections averaged roughly 98 percent of what was budgeted for between 1995 and 2012, according to Auditor Department records. However, revenue declined to about 81 percent of estimates in 2013, the year court computer software problems began.
Revenue was about 82 percent last year when a computer crash led to 90,000 records being lost and a massive retrieval effort began. About 59 percent of revenue has been collected this year.
Auditor Ron Mantini mentioned the low revenue at Monday’s City Council Finance & Claims Committee meeting. Mantini said after the meeting that he wants to find out if the decline is due to a lack of revenue or problems collecting it because of the crash.
“We need all the money we can get this year,” Mantini said.
Less collection revenue would come at a bad time for Lorain, which has a $33 million annual budget and about 450 workers for a city of 64,000. Lorain has lost about $1 million in revenue this year due to hundreds of layoffs at Republic Steel and U.S. Steel’s Lorain Tubular Operations earlier this year.
Money from recycled steel byproducts from the former RTI steel mill is about $1.3 million less than the $2 million projected due to a worldwide drop in demand.
Mantini said it’s too early to say how the city will compensate if collections don’t meet projections. Mantini said he and Mayor Chase Ritenauer are working on a plan, which includes dealing with less steel plant revenue. Ritenauer said last week that he’s hoping to avoid layoffs or service cuts next year, but nothing is off the table.
Mantini said he’s planning to meet Thursday with Court Clerk Lori Maiorana to discuss the low revenue and the court’s failure to reconcile its books to its bank accounts in 2013 and last year. Ohio Auditor’s Office annual audits cited the deficiencies in its annual audits of Lorain the last two years.
Maiorana didn’t return calls Monday night.
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