Economic development is being established as a priority for the town’s 2013-14 budget, with $375,438 being proposed to implement the recently-adopted economic development strategy.

The budget plan proposes the town spend $90,240 from the General Fund to help implement the economic strategies. This is an increase of more than 500 percent from what was budgeted this current fiscal year.

This is in addition to proposed funding of $285,198 from the downtown excise tax, creating a total economic development budget of $375,438.

Four items, funded from the excise tax, include Christmas lighting ($30,050), JumpStartBiz business incubator ($4,500), event marketing ($25,000) and the Greater Phoenix Economic Council ($8,844 from General Fund).

The town is a participating member of GPEC and the money is a membership fee based on a per-capita formula and population.

JumpStartBiz is a fee for a service agreement with the incubator program, which has demonstrated some success in helping new businesses getting started. The town was asked for $25,000 in funding, but the $4,500 is equal to last year’s funding and is the town manager’s recommendation.

The total remaining for implementation of the Economic Development Plan is $307,044. That funding is to be used for business attraction, business retention and expansion, retail attraction, education, downtown development and tourism.

The tourism element of economic development is based on an ongoing strategy and there is $158,000 in the budget to fund this.

The town has worked closely with the Chamber of Commerce and its Tourism Bureau on a fee for service agreement for several years. Staff is recommending the bureau be allotted $103,000, which is part of the $158,000 mentioned above. This is the same as the current fiscal year. The bureau had requested $125,000 for the upcoming year.

The tourism budget also includes Fort McDowell Prop 202 funding at $30,000, Chamber Commerce funding of $20,000 and $5,000 in miscellaneous income.