photo by: Eric Ayres

Wheeling City Councilmen Ty Thorngate, left, and Dave Palmer, chairman of the Finance Committee of Council, attend a meeting this month to review the city's November financial report.

WHEELING — The city of Wheeling is heading into the end of the calendar year on good financial footing, according to officials, who noted that revenues are up so far this fiscal year.

Members of the Finance Committee of Wheeling City Council this month reviewed and approved the November financial report from the city. The figures reflect the first five months of the current 2025-26 fiscal year that began in July and detail expenses and revenues through the end of November, the most recently completed month on the books.

City Manager Robert Herron said Wheeling’s revenues are about $950,000 ahead of the same time last year.

“The business and occupation tax is already ahead of budget,” Herron said. “Granted, December is a light B&O month, but there will be collections during the month of December. We’re $682,000 ahead of the same time last year on business and occupation tax.”

Municipal sales tax collections are also up with half of the collections received for the fiscal year.

The city is already solidly above the projected revenues from sales tax as outlined in this year’s budget.

“We’re $307,000 ahead on that,” Herron said of the Municipal Sales Tax revenues.

On the expense side, the city is “a little bit ahead,” as well, according to the city manager. But officials noted that there is cause for optimism as line items that contributed to ballooning expenses during the last fiscal year appear to be much more in check.

Toward the second half of the 2024-25 fiscal year, Wheeling officials looked to tighten the city’s fiscal belt as spending in the public safety forces had grown significantly. Officials contributed much of the additional expenses to the fact that vacancies in the police and fire departments had led to a necessary use of overtime to cover shifts. A number of the vacancies have been filled throughout the 2025 calendar year which city leaders said helps stabilize spending on personnel in those vital departments.

“I am pleased to announce that on the police side, even though the police budget is slightly ahead of where we should be percentage wise, personnel is actually below the 41.6%,” Herron said, noting that projected figures for both expenditures and revenues with five of the 12 months completed in the fiscal year should be equivalent to 41.6% of the total year’s budget.

In the Wheeling Fire Department, expenditures for fire personnel are just slightly above the projected budget, Herron added.

“That’s good news in those departments, particularly as it relates to overtime,” he said. “All in all, it’s been a pretty solid five months of the year thus far.”

Councilman Dave Palmer, chairman of the Finance Committee of Council, questioned a couple of expenses that jumped out in the November financial report. One of those was for the municipal judge’s budget. According to the city manager, this is a reflection of a new cost sharing mechanism between counties and larger municipalities that recently was approved in Charleston.

Herron said that during a recent legislative session, action was approved that now makes cities pay for certain jail expenses associated with offenses for which city police write citations.

“Costs associated with that are in the judge’s budget – it’s about $28,000 so far this year,” Herron explained of the increase in expenses because of this new rule.

“These are charges that the city is responsible for the first few days,” Herron said of certain jail costs related to offenses charged by city police. “We didn’t use to have to do that. That was a legislative mandate. We did ask our legislators to vote against that, which they all did, but unfortunately, it did pass.”

Another spike in the monthly financial report’s expenses was in the recycling department. Herron explained that the figures show a $209,000 expense for a new recycling truck, but a grant will offset that expense.