Tucson Citizen.com
Caveat Lector - Politics, Government and the Free Press – by Mark B. Evans

City Council needs to cut programs and lay off staff to balance budget

by on Feb. 26, 2010, under Editorials, Politics

Poor Mike Letcher. The Tucson city manager keeps trying to balance the city’s budget but the city council keeps hiding under the covers and telling him to try again.

Oh, sure, the council has cut millions out of the budget the past two years, mostly by nickel-and-diming the city staff with pay freezes, pay cuts, furloughs and a handful of layoffs.

But that hasn’t been enough, next year’s budget is still out of whack by more than $30 million.

It didn’t have to be this way. The last city manager, Mike Hein, the guy the council fired, predicted these tough times back in 2008 and gave the council some bitter pills to swallow, among them the elimination of numerous city programs, closing some city facilities and reductions in staff.

The layoffs were the key because the city charter requires public votes on significant tax increases and voters are in no mood to up their taxes. The overwhelming majority of the city’s general operating budget goes to staff salaries. If the council had significantly pared city services and staff back then, it would still be realizing those savings now.

There would still be a large budget hole to fill, thanks to shortsighted voters yanking $20 million out of this year’s budget by failing to pass the Home Rule option in November. But if the council had taken its medicine back in early 2009, it could cover the Home Rule hole with some of the piddly stuff that they’ve been doing in the past year, rather than still facing the yawning gap that menaces the fiscal 2011 budget.

Letcher has managed to trim some city staff, but the council in January told him they don’t want any more layoffs, especially not from the public safety agencies, which account for two thirds of city discretionary spending.

So Letcher, his hands tied, is trying again. This week he proposed several budget balancing measures, most of them awful, some more so than others.

The worst is proposing to add food to the sales tax list. In a city where the majority of residents have household incomes hovering around the federal poverty line, taxing food is a horrendous idea.

So is eliminating the bus fare subsidies given to nonprofit agencies that serve the poor, disabled or otherwise disadvantaged. Stickin’ it to the poor and disabled is a terrible way to balance a budget.

Mortgaging city hall, a page torn out of the discredited state Legislature’s playbook, is also a dumb idea. Why should Tucson taxpayers of 2030 have to pay the interest on a loan taken out in 2010 by a city council too chicken to make tough budget decisions?

Other ideas, though, aren’t bad, such as creating a jail-tax district. The city pays the county about $8 million a year for jail services. A special taxing district would raise the money to cover that, thereby relieving the general fund of the burden.

The tax would have the added benefit of forcing taxpayers to pay attention to criminal justice issues. Lock-‘em-up-and-throw-away-the-key policies are expensive. A tax directly connected to those policies would drive that point home.

Privatizing the golf courses and adding UA student purchases to the sales tax list (why weren’t they taxed in the first place?) are also decent ideas.

But the good ideas don’t balance the budget. Neither do the bad ones. The city will need them all, or nearly all, to close the gap.

It’s a sure bet some or all of these proposals will bring out the angry mobs, just as the last batch of budget-balancing proposals did. And that means a parade of people at council public hearings taking their three minutes at the podium to tell the council members they suck.

But the council can’t keep caving in to constituent pressure in which one constituency wants the budget balanced on the backs of some other constituency.

There are no easy, painless ways to balance the city budget. The city needs to look to itself to solve its budget problem. The council needs to buck up and cut city spending. That means eliminating programs and laying off staff – cops and firefighters included.

From there, it can relax and take its time rebuilding the budget from the ruins. That means going to voters with charter revisions to improve the city’s budgeting process and diversify its income so it’s not constantly at the mercy of the economy.

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This entry was posted on Friday, February 26th, 2010 at 10:51 am and is filed under Editorials, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  • leftfield

    I’m lovin’ it!  Is there no one out there though, who will come forward on these pages with an explanation as to how undocumented migrants are responsible for this? 

    • radmax

      Ok, since you called me out, the entire process is encumbered by the entitlement programs. Sad, but true. How many buses have you seen lately with at least 50% capacity? Subsidizing all the niche groups is driving this entire country to bankruptcy…What, everybody needs a trip to Wallmart? This crap has got to stop!…only a bomb throwin’ Trotskyite could revel in this dire circumstance…and look for opportunity…and by niche groups, I mean those who we cater to. No one has catered to me, and I’ve had some pretty rough times. Hangin’ in there, but gettin’ pretty fed up.

  • tiponeill

    subsidizing ? Entitlement programs ? niche groups ?
    you talkin to me ? you talkin to me ? ;)
    The only entitlement I’ve seen around here are the large number of voters who seem to feel that they are entitled to city services without paying any taxes for them.

  • radmax

    Tax the rich, feed the poor, ’till there are no, rich no more…then who pays?(Sorry Alvin) I’m startin’ to think Lefty’s ‘each to their own abilities’(as much as I dislike Marx) makes a lot of sense in this gimme world today. Put ‘em to work and shut down the borders like Berlin circa ’62. I have no problems with those who carry the tax burden, those who find every loophole and can afford to pay should be shot… or worse ;) Geez, I’m startin’ to sound like a bomb throwin’ Trotskyite…

    “But what of the disabled” they moaned…of course there are those who must be wards of the state, should their circumstances warrant, just can’t abide freeloaders, when we have to work 1/3 of the year to just pay our ‘own fair share’ of the taxman’s due.
    PS-”you talkin’ ta me?”…If it wasn’t for you Tip, all city, county, state, yea and verily, the entire nations books would be in the black… ;)

    • leftfield

      Hi Rad,  the quote is “…from each according to ability, to each according to need”.  Now, this was Marx’s vision of the state of things in a utopian and mature communist society, after the state had been rendered unnecessary and withered away.  His vision prior to those events was “from each according to ability, to each according to contribution”.   We’ll be expecting a lot from you, Rad.  From F. Bubba, not so much.

      • radmax

        Yes, I used the part of the quote which best seemed to suit our circumstance. Talk to Uncle Karl for me would ya?…I’m sure he wouldn’t mind, Utopia being only a stone’s throw away and all…

  • bob caylor

    No one yet has talked about the HIGH retirement benifits the city fire
    and police get after 20 years or so—something like 45-60% of their normal income at retirement. That should be reduced for all new city employees hired in the future. The fire and police chiefs will be pretty arogant if you ask the for any  reduction in salary or retirement pay. They have not been team players in reducing cost in their departments.

  • Terry Finefrock

    Great article identifying Politicians, who value politics over basic business fundamentals, as the root cause for the present unacceptable financial conditions. We need to have persons who truly understand fundamental business propositions and are competent and experienced in managing budgets to create and sustain long term, not just short term, prosperity lead our local governments. They make the promises necessary to be elected, then offer EXPLANATIONS,  regarding  their failure to provide promised and concrete value to the MAJORITY of taxpayers and  to act to sustain the LONG term prosperity of our community. As the article identifies they make irresponsible promises regarding DISCRETIONARY expenditures and then offer Operations Management as scapegoats when they cannot balance budgets, get blood from the proverbial stone. This permissive Leadership value system exists at Federal, State, Local Government and Universities Non-productive behaviors include: 1. Failure to recognize that there is only one base \revenue source\ for all Agencies, the working taxpayer, and to consider and integrate the financial burdens and total costs they assess, and the need/their responsibility to CREATE MORE Taxpayers. Chronic and long-term failure to create local higher wage jobs (more taxpayers) that would increase tax revenues at current tax rates,  reduce the amount of tax(cost) that must be recovered from each taxpayer and to retain our children as members of our community. Instead they make ego-based or political decisions that serve the highly compensated administrations, academics, not the teachers, and establish the UA as NATIONAL Research asset/benefit using the common facilities paid for by students/parents(taxpayers) instead of acquiring FEDERAL & Private sector funds to pay for the common facilities and allow the Students to use them for free. 2. Failure to recognize that economy and income cycles from high/lows and to MANAGE and control fixed and discretionary expenditures at levels LOWER than historical income low-points; \Basic Management 101\.. Cannot say NO to special interests and DISCRETIONARY spending that does not service a strong majority of taxpayers; if it doesn’t serve 80%(Conceptual %, not intended to be actual) of the TAXPAYERS, others should not be given a significant Vote/Voice, don’t provide the material or service AND don’t tax or charge for it. Failure to detect and manage decisions regarding our Community  obligation to provide services to those who CANNOT help themselves Vs. those who make bad decisions and choose not to help themselves. 3. Failure to hold themselves PERSONALLY responsible for providing concrete, real and recurring value to Taxpayers(not special Interests). Instead, when the fail, when it is determined that the INFINITE promises they have made cannot be satisfied with available and FINITE resources they offer and sacrifice  Operational Management staff. Not only unfair but UNPRODUCTIVE…competent Management quickly learn the risk and avoid Public service or open and frank discussions with the Council or their Board. Solutions? 1) Increase revenues via JOB CREATION not increases in tax rates , tuition, fees, surcharges and additional burdens on taxpayers. Will also improve self-esteem, community contribution and reduce public cost burden for those that are unemployed. For exampledevelopment of ACC Rules and Federal funding that would use abundant natural resource/solar energy and promote large scale local deployment of solar electric technology to reemploy lost higher wage construction workers, attract employers to this region, and reduce the TOTAL costs to taxpayers and ratepayers for Brown Power such as water usage (TEP will use about 5 to 7 BILLION gallons of water to generate 2010 energy sales); acid rain, respiratory  and other health-care costs, imminent carbon penalties, EPA Air quality charges, etc. Acquire Federal funds and leverage UA Technology Park and AZRISE knowledge to establish a LOCAL Gigawatt Solar Concentrating power plant, with solar storage and DRY cooling technology, to stabilize community costs, conserve water for 50 years or more…and to provide \As Built\ improved specifications for DOE and other Western States with similar energy and water issues to deploy and further develop the technology and costs. The technology, knowledge and solution can then be sold to rest of the world. 2. Eliminate DISCRETIONARY spending that does not serve majority of Taxpayers; establish & maintain fixed budgets at or below historical low revenue levels, tie discretionary spending to actual banked  surpluses. Aggressively and effectively protect/preserve provision of assistance to those that CANNOT help themselves by identifying and eliminating those that choose not to help themselves. In conjunction w/Job CREATION, provide Job Training, reduction and dependence on long term public assistance; teach them the fish rather than giving them fish, for long periods of time.  3. Establish quantifiable and realistic PERFORMANCE measures and enabling actions required to achieve them; Frequent Reporting of actual performance to interim and ultimate performance goals, enabling actions, and corrective actions to recover past due schedule and goals as scheduled. The more frequent the measurement, the more rapid the rate of change. Management responsible for achieving the goals must agree that the goals are realistically achievable, be party to their development and held contractually responsible for achievement. 4. Establish Organizational Productivity & Cost Reduction Programs/Incentives Adopt proven Private sector Process improvement methodologies and culture to improve Employee Productivity and reduction in costs, improvements in value-adds. Include use of employee suggestion programs to leverage and use employee ’intelligence’ and rapid implementation of effective process improvements. Am certain that there are many more variations and enhancements on these themes and solutions; it’s critical that our Leadership act quickly and effectively generate needed and recurring change; status quo strategies and conduct will generate status quo and unacceptable results.

  • Entropy

    Holy crap!
     
    Great wall of text hits me for 54 points of damage.

  • http://thestatecolumn.com kramer phillips

    Nice article. The use of sin taxes seems to be a popular idea. I like the idea of taxing some of the above mentioned ideas as well. Food taxes seem to be a bit problematic in two ways: one, what food items are being taxesd; two, how is food defined. Read this article: http://thestatecolumn.com/articles/article_sin_taxes_98365.php
     
    I think we are seeing pages pulled out a popular playbook and more structural problems need to be addressed.
     
    Putting city hall up for mortgage is not the answer.
     
    kramer phillips
    httP;//thestatecolumn.com

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