The following is an exerpt from the Sidney Citizen's 4/15/10 letter in response to how "they" would handle our $650,000.00 shortfall in the city budget.
I would love to hear from my readers what they think.
1. Stop the bleeding NOW!
a. Limit economic developement (e.d.)dollars spent to e.d. dollars collected and rec'vd. The state is keeping this money, so until we get it, don't spend it from the general fund. TRANSPARENCY! Stop hiding the actual costs of our local e.d. efforts.
b. Stop all new projects & capital expenditures without the express vote of
approval from the council.
c. Lower spending authority from $20,000 to $5,000
d. Rescind the current budget and hold and emergency budget session to
address the budget shortfall in the current budget.
e. Stop all budget expenditures for Boot Hill, Camp Outlook, Recreation
management fees, etc. These types of expenditures are not necessary for the
operation of the city and can be accomplished by volunteer labor and private
donations.
2. Identify and eliminate the inefficient organization of our city government.
a. Eliminate duplication of management levels and effort
I Eliminate Public Service Director position.
II Eliminate GIS position.
III Eliminate the tech shop
IV Eliminate electric dept's crew chief position.
V Separate the City Mgr & E.D. jobs.
VI Move E.D. & associated funding out of the city's general fund to the
chamber of commerce office (owned by the City)
VII Reduce city managers salary & benefits to an ammount commensurate with
those of other communities this size with a $100,000.00 total comp pkg
cap. (current city manager has priced himself out of a job at over
$125,000.00.
VIII Consider early retirement pkg for long term, highly comp employees.
3. Look at employee cost:
a. Permanently eliminate longevity pay - this is merely a hidden pay raise
benefitting long term employees.
b. Freeze all new hires.
c. Eliminate annual bonuses.
d. Freeze and eliminate all automatic wage increases. Instead, institute
a systematic employee evaluation system with an annual cost of living
adjustment when the economy and budgets support wage increases.
e. Temporarily reduce the 401k pension match
f. Freeze all non required travel and training.
g. Consider a 2 day furlough each month for every employee, 1 day per pay period
without pay, no vacation or sick leave used for those days.
h. Change non-safety related work hours to 4 10-hour days per week to save on
operating costs in every non safety dept.
i. Require dept heads to leave city vehicles at work and commute to & from work
with personal vehicles.
4. Identify and dispose of assets, equipment, and tools that are no longer used.
5. Purchase our own street crack sealing maching and have it operated by employees
of all depts when they have idle time - this needs to be an ongoing process.
6. Evaluate the potential cost savings of having a city construction crew in lieu of
hiring out the smaller projects - they could run the street sealing process when
not working on city jobs.
Note from Kelroy:
Well, there ya go. They are all legitimate ways of cutting the budget, your thoughts.....
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