Rehoboth to increase donations 50 percent for local groups

Rehoboth Beach commissioners were feeling generous when they recently approved a roughly 50 percent increase in cash donations to city organizations for next year’s budget.

In the current fiscal year, there’s a total of $200,000 in donations from the city going toward the Rehoboth Beach Volunteer Fire Company, Rehoboth Beach Main Street, Rehoboth Beach Public Library and Rehoboth Beach Museum. As approved during a budget meeting Feb. 7, those four organizations will now receive a total of $305,000.

The Rehoboth fire company will be given the standard $100,000, plus an additional $50,000 to put toward a new ladder truck. RBVFC Chief Chuck Snyder said the current ladder truck is 20 years old.

Commissioners said they were happy to support the fire department, but voiced their displeasure with the contribution of other municipalities. According to a fire department budget prepared for the meeting, last year, Dewey Beach donated $5,000, Henlopen Acres donated $2,000 and North Shores donated $1,000.

The Rehoboth Beach Museum will see a donation of $20,000, an increase of $10,000 over the current year. Museum Director Nancy Alexander said the increase will go toward service maintenance contracts and small repairs.

The Rehoboth library was the one organization that received votes against its request, but commissioners ultimately voted in favor of increasing the city’s donation to $75,000. It’s an amount more than double this year’s donation of $30,000.

Library Director Alison Miller said the library is running at a deficit because it increased its employee pay to match the pay scale used by Sussex County for its library employees. The additional $45,000 gets the Rehoboth library out of the deficit, said Miller.

Commissioners also agreed to mark off three more 30-minute spots for library users in the Martins Lawn parking lot off Christian Street.

Coming in at $60,000, Rehoboth Beach Main Street didn’t request any additional funding.

Regarding the museum and Main Street, the city’s cash donations do not include its payment of some utilities and the free rental of city-owned buildings. The city also pays the library’s water, sewer and trash bills.

Rehoboth’s fiscal year runs from April 1 to March 31. As of the Feb. 7 meeting, City Manager Sharon Lynn is presenting a balanced budget coming in at roughly $29.8 million. That’s about a 6 percent increase over the current fiscal year budget of $27.7 million.

Rehoboth has scheduled a fourth budget meeting for Friday, Feb. 18. Expected topics of discussion include a detailed look at the $6.2 million capital improvement budget and how to spend the $500,000 the city will receive from the county as it reallocates excess realty transfer tax revenue.

Parking enforcement season changed, increase to residential meter rates 

During a special meeting prior to the Feb. 7 budget meeting, commissioners voted to change the time frame of the parking enforcement season and to increase the residential parking meter rates.

Beginning this year, the parking enforcement season will run from May 15 through Sept. 15. Previously, the season was defined as the Friday before Memorial Day through the second Sunday after Labor Day. Commissioners had been considering making the season May 1 to Sept. 30, but decided against that.

Commissioners also changed the parking meter rate to $3 per hour citywide. Previously, in mostly residential areas, the price for some metered locations was $2 an hour.

Both recommendations came at the suggestion of city staff, who said the changes will make information easier to communicate and understand.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to show Henlopen Acres contributed $2,000 and North Shores donated $1,000 to the Rehoboth Beach Volunteer Fire Department.