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Home » News » 2025 » July

News Brief

July 3, 2025 |  By: Gavin McGough

The City of St Joseph adopted its 2025 to ‘26 budget

Schumacher says, "You know, the budget overall was basically flat. We did allocate additional funds to address abandoned, dangerous buildings. There was an increase of about 150,000 towards that effort. Then we also set aside funds to really focus on partnerships with different organizations across the community."

McGough asks, "How many abandoned buildings are there in St. Joe and why did this become a funding priority this year?"

Schumacher says, "So right now we're just under 50 properties that are on the list. That doesnt mean that they will be demolished but abandoned buildings are you dangerous by definition because they're at risk of collapse. Missouri is an abiding influence on our neighborhoods and the community as a whole. And, you know, it's not necessarily an exciting part of our book of business, but it's a very important one for just livability. So when you have abandoned, dangerous building next door, it impacts an entire block. So, you know, it's important that we address the safety issue and we clean that block up."

"Your budgeting process began in November, 2024. Uh, what was that process like?", asks McGough. 

"So, one of the things that we really focused on was increasing transparency in the budget. So, the previous budget model utilized a great deal of transfers and we eliminated those. It's really easy to see the dollars that are in, you know, this account or this other account exactly where they're going. And, and I wanna be clear, it wasn't wrong before it was well within, you know, accounting standards, but for the average person who wanted to read it. It presented challenges, so it's much easier now for everyone to understand it.", responds Schumacher. 

McGough asks, "So recently the city council completed a survey which was open to all city residents about you know, what they'd like to see in the community. Tell us about that project. How will it impact city projects moving forward?"

"So, you know, about two years ago, this mayor and council and city staff put together really a strategic plan. So foundation of this, this overall conversation. Then we did a citizen survey, right? Take the guesswork out, what does our customers wanna see, and what do they feel we can do better? And, the results from that survey are gonna guide the organization, you know, going forward. So, change is here. Um, now we just gotta get it over the goal line, if we will.", says Schumacher. 

Click here to view a user-friendly overview of their budget.