Excerpts from the daily-journal.com:
Due to hot-running revenues in Bradley — most notably sales tax figures — Bradley may be the only municipality in Illinois to have its police and fire pension funds fully funded.
At Monday’s Bradley Village Board meeting, the board unanimously approved the request of the finance director to amend its Fiscal Year 2021 budget as a result of surging revenues which will result in a budget surplus of $4,767,431.
As a result of these positive figures, Bradley will soon transfer $1,501,894 into its fire pension fund to bring it to 100 percent funding at $3.2 million, and fully fund the $34 million police pension fund by selling $11.8 million of pension obligation bonds to fill a $10.5 million hole in the fund. These bonds are to be repaid in 20 years.
In the year of the COVID-19-induced pandemic, Bradley is bucking the trend and reaping the benefits of a strong retail base — anchored by a collection of retailers deemed essential.
Revenues have outpaced expenses at such a pace that a budget surplus of nearly $4.8 million is projected and all but $1,164,431 of the surplus is being plugged into the existing budget.
In addition to transferring $1.5 million into the fire pension account, the village board also OK’d:
• Transferring $1 million from its general fund to the capital projects fund to pay for the new fire station at 1690 Newtowne Drive.
• Transferring $600,000 to pay for police vehicles, accounting software and road improvements.
• Transferring $500,000 to pay toward the planned Lil’s Park splash pad.
Michael McCue, president of the Bradley Fire Pension Fund, was asked to attend the meeting without any knowledge as to why. Shortly after the meeting began, he was called to the front of the board room to receive an oversized check of $1,501,894 made payable to the pension account and dated March 8, 2021.
The village made changes in the way it operated, doing things such as closing its police dispatch center and going the countywide system as well as general belt-tightening.
