Mayor’s budget spares jobs
Reserve would cover much of $8 million gap
It sounded dour, but the bottom line to most Spokane residents is that fixing Spokane’s $8 million hole won’t affect them much.
Spokane Mayor Mary Verner presented her 2012 budget Monday.
It included no cuts to the numbers of police or fire employees, and, in fact, the numbers would increase by five police officers and 13 fire employees to serve the West Plains, 10 square miles of which will become part of the city on Jan. 1. It would preserve the city’s library branches. Her proposal would freeze the street budget to 2011 levels, but that’s before the $20 tab tax is factored in. No employees are expected to be laid off, though some jobs will be held open.
“We are singularly focused on making sure our citizens are safe, and we’ve had a steady focus on supporting the private sector and supporting business so families can have good household wages and they can afford to spend,” Verner said.
Some of the downside: the city’s arts and youth departments would be drastically reduced and some of the three employees who work in those programs could be shifted elsewhere. In order to preserve the city’s Weights and Measures Department, Verner proposes to create fees so the department would no longer be subsidized with tax revenue. The library’s material budgets likely will be cut in a way Verner described as “drastic.”
Much of the $8 million gap would be made up by using money held in reserve, such as from an insurance fund that Chief Financial Officer Gavin Cooley said is overfunded. There also are across-the-board cuts affecting most departments as well as almost $1 million cut by reducing jail expenses partly by shifting to alternatives to incarceration.
Verner’s budget doesn’t include raised tax rates beyond the 1 percent property tax increase most cities approve each year or new or increased fees, except what would be needed to save Weights and Measures.
She told the council, however, that she is open to new revenue sources to preserve services like the art program, though she believes her budget is one “that we can live with.”
“I don’t like any service cuts to our citizens,” Verner said. “We’re providing good service, but we’re providing bare minimum service because we can’t afford more. So if the council would like to provide more they’re going to have to provide more revenue. That’s why I put the ideas out to City Council.”
Possible revenue includes Council President Joe Shogan’s plan to raise parking ticket fees from $15 to $25. Other ideas include some that Verner suggested when she presented a draft budget in May, such as raising the hotel tax or shifting fees from red light camera tickets from a fund for traffic safety to help balance the budget.
Some of those revenue ideas face stiff opposition. Neighborhood leaders, for instance, have opposed shifting red light camera ticket money. Other potential fights ahead include street funding. Some City Council members have said they oppose freezing the street budget because they want to ensure that the new tab tax money can make a noticeable improvement in street maintenance.