City Manager Glen T. Adams presents his proposed 2025-26 budget to the Homewood City Council on Aug. 25, 2025. Image courtesy of City of Homewood via YouTube
On the eve of a municipal election that will bring new leadership to Homewood, City Manager Glen T. Adams stood before the Homewood City Council Monday night with a $128.5 million proposal — the first budget under the city’s new council-manager form of government.
“This is probably one of the most vetted budget cycles I've personally been through,” Adams told council members, crediting staff and department heads for weeks of work. “Our total budget, and I want to remind everybody, this is going to change weekly until we are done with the budget because we're getting refined information. So our total budget of all funds is 128,511,652.”
The spending plan includes a $75.6 million operational budget, based on a 2% revenue increase and a $3.3 million carryover. It builds in a 3.5% cost-of-living raise for employees, a 5% merit pay increase and a tiered bonus if surpluses allow. Nearly $21 million is set aside for capital expenses.
Adams ticked through the council’s priorities: $27.2 million for Homewood schools, money for new fire trucks and design work for a new fire station, and $2.18 million for stormwater and creek wall projects. Then he paused on one line item the council had just acted on — the Lakeshore Drive/I-65 diverging diamond interchange.
“The diverging diamond, which you all thankfully approved tonight, to me, that's a very critical infrastructure requirement,” Adams said. He laid out the city’s $5.85 million share alongside contributions from ALDOT, the MPO and Jefferson County. “It fixes critical traffic congestion. Anybody who's been in traffic congestion knows you don't wanna go there, so this fixes that so it allows that improvement in the redevelopment of that area.”
Adams told the council the plan was balanced and forward-looking. “One of my most important goals in life is to make sure that none of my subordinate leaders is accepting risk, meaning we don't give them the things they need to be able to do their jobs,” he said. “I feel very comfortable with it. It is a balanced budget.”
When he finished, it fell to Mayor Alex Wyatt — serving out his only year as interim mayor and not on the ballot Tuesday — to frame the presentation in the city’s larger story.
“You know this year's a little bit different because we've got a city manager thankfully,” Wyatt said, thanking Adams, staff and council leaders. “I think that Glen has done a good job of changing how we look at the budget, how we come up with a budget, and I think you will see that when you're reviewing it that that has made the process more efficient for you and more effective.”
For Wyatt, any budget is a reflection of values. “Any budget is in my mind really a list of priorities — it's how we want to spend the residents’ money on the services and projects that they have come to expect,” he said. “This budget is no different. Quite frankly it represents the same priorities that we have always valued in Homewood.”
He pointed to the $27 million set aside for schools, employee raises and bonuses, stormwater improvements, and continued support for public safety. He called the diverging diamond “a huge project” with a return on investment hard to match.
And, he said, the creation of a capital projects fund to prepare for future needs was “a remarkable step forward that Glen has brought us.”
“This budget, like the ones in the past, includes spending, again, the residents’ money, tax money on projects and services that we have all come to expect in Homewood,” Wyatt said. “These are the same projects and services that make us the envy of other cities around us. They're what make this little city of eight square miles the city that everyone enjoys living in, the city that everyone wants to move to, wants to work in.”
Tuesday, voters will elect a new mayor and largely a new council to inherit the plan. Wyatt closed by telling members to study it closely in hearings ahead and improve upon it for final approval.
The council also:
-- Approved a $3 million tax incentive for Piggly Wiggly expansion;
-- Selected Moses as new audit firm;
-- Approved safety changes at Oxmoor and St. Charles;
-- Approved ADA ramp and stair gating contracts for Dawson parking deck;
-- Declared, carried over or dropped multiple nuisance property cases.
