The Wood County Park District has approved a temporary 2025 budget that allows pay raises for its employees.
At the park board’s July 9 meeting, members approved the 2025 statutory budget that includes a 3% raise for all employees. The final 2025 budget will be approved in December.
Board member Jonathan Smith said the increase was appropriate.
“I wish we could do more most of the time, but this is very reasonable,” said board President Rebecca Ferguson.
The park district’s 30 full-time staff and eight part-time employees will get the cost-of-living increase.
The additional cost to the district will be $65,000, said district Director Chris Smalley.
Staff als received a 3% raise in January.
The board’s preliminary budget for 2025 is $4,365,289, which includes $2,061,104 for salaries; $378,000 for employee health insurance; $379,000 for contract services; $300,000 for capital improvements; $193,550 for equipment; $339,790 for employee retirement contributions; and $100,000 each for local grants and land acquisition.
Less than $100,000 was budgeted for additional line items including contract repairs, travel and expenses, advertising and printing, materials, Medicare, rentals, unemployment compensation and workers compensation.
Also at the meeting, Assistant Director Andrew Kalmar recapped capital improvements the park district has made in 2024.
The ramp replacement at W. W. Knight Nature Preserve in Perrysburg is now complete.
“It is extremely low maintenance,” Kalmar said.
The ramp is heated so as not to ice over in the winter.
Way-finding signs at the preserve also are finally done and installed, he said.
The park district used Ohio Department of Transportation funds to pave William Henry Harrison Park in Pemberville. The berms will be filled this September.
Kiosks have been updated at Adam Phillips Pond and the Bradner Preserve, where the restroom also was updated.
New benches have been added at several parks and the paint and pavement at the Rudolph bike park have been updated.
A fence has been installed on either side of the Range Line Road entrance to Baldwin Woods Preserve.
The kitchen at the stone shelter house at Otsego Park has been remodeled and the exterior of the garage at the park has been renovated.
“This is not an inclusive list, but it gives you an idea of what’s going on,” Kalmar said.
The to-do list includes refurbishing the Rudolph rest station, updating the stone trails at W. W. Knight Preserve and Cedar Creeks Preserve, updating the playground surface at Otsego Park and replacing the windows at the Sawyer Quarry Nature Preserve naturalists’ office.
Smalley said they had budgeted $350,000 for capital improvements this year.
“We’re not at that point yet,” he said.
The board also placed into surplus to be sold 14 plastic folding chairs, one fiberglass over aluminum canoe, a 2010 Ford 3DC shuttle bus, a 2016 Dodge pickup truck, a metal carport and a tow-behind mower.
