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August 20th, 2007
SPENDING CUTS? BULLFEATHERS!: CITY COMMISSION STILL 14% OVERBUDGET
Everyone understands cutting your expenses to meet your income. In bad times we all have to do it. Everyone except the New Smyrna Beach City Commission. According to the Daytona Beach News-Journal the city’s general fund budget in 2001 was $6,812,658.00 (a nice piece of change). The News-Journal has also published the city’s rate of growth as 16.74% between 2000 and 2007. Governor Crist told the cities that he wanted their budgets to be the same as in 2001 plus the rate of inflation and growth. Florida’s economic health depends upon local government officials getting their spending under control. The New Smyrna Beach budget should have gone up 32.74% since 2001. Using the Governor’s formula the city should have a $10,128,840 budget. At the budget workshops, the City Commission approved a $11,782,000 plus budget (it was hard to tell from their discussion). This included raiding the city’s emergency funds for $1,100,000. That means the City Commission is still $1,653,159.68 over budget. The city is no where near the Governor’s local government spending goal. Taking into account their cust so far, they are still 14% over the Governors Target. It is time to hold another workshop and cut some more. LINK
NOTES
1. We are very concerned about the continued loss to the city if the rosy projections of revenue from the Municipal Golf Course and Sports Complex do not materialize. These are not small numbers. In the last full year of operation before renovation, the loss was $154,000, and amortizing the loan, that we now are told is $3.3 million, is over $205,000 annually without regard to operational losses. That is almost $360,000 plus over the 2005 revenue figure. We have no confidence in that their projections being met, particularly when there are four other golf courses available, making a total of five counting the muni, in an environment of fewer players and more courses.
Despite the questionable figures in the proposed budget, it looks like the deficit at the Sports Complex has been and will continue to be in the neighborhood of $500,000 annually. The School Board has been asked to pick up the tab. Why should it? Physical education has been of low priority for years, and the City has permitted them to pay little or nothing for their use of our facilities. Will the City refuse to permit high school teams to play if they do not agree to better terms? We think not, but the City Commission should keep the pressure on. They should also seek recompense from all organizations that use the facility, but are not NSB based. If we are going to proclaim that we run enterprise operations such as the marina, golf course, and others, the sports complex should be viewed in that light as well. The total bill for that complex is over $700,000 annually, and in the current economic climate, we need the money.
2. There is no question that at the meeting of the Commission on Tuesday August 14, 2007, there was a large turnout, particularly from that portion of the real estate industry that views Ordinance 97-05 to be totally bizarre, illegal, and counter to the best interest of this community. The Mayor sought to kill it and the four others voted to delay consideration until after the election. The Planning and Zoning Board recommended approval of this proposal, which includes not permitting, rebuilding of existing condominiums more than four stories if damaged, is listed below. The members are listed below:
Christopher Kelley
Sally E. Mackay, Chair
James W. Taylor
Rick Tresher
David Westerheide
Hans Wolfer
Please note that the chair of this Board is one of our Mayoral candidates, and yet there was not one word from her or her Board that this was an odd way to preserve confidence that buyers or owners would be able to get a mortgage or insure most of the property on the Beach. Whose idea was this anyway? Given the threat of four lawsuits concerning its unconstitutionality, you would think that the City Attorney would have expressed a legal opinion on the subject, as he is want to do. Perhaps the thinking was if “we” win in November, we can pass this ordinance. Interestingly, also, the Planning and Zoning Board had an amendment prepared to limit the effect of their own ordinance, but it was not presented either. Could they at least favor us with a copy of this floating amendment so that we ignorant taxpayers can figure out what is in their collective heads?
1. Well we cannot resist. Although we are planning to analyze the memoranda submitted by department heads regarding their recommendations for reducing their FY 2008 budgets by 14%, we cannot resist printing the following excerpt from the Fire Chief's submission He states, that: LINK in BLOCK or click here, (see page 2)
“ Personal Leave Policy and Enforcement
A policy controlling the misuse of personal leave needs to be implemented for all departments in order to cut down in overtime costs. This action alone could save the city and fire department thousands of dollars yearly.”
What is he doing now? Is he admitting to doing a lousy job, that he is allowing his fire department personnel to abuse sick leave, and he is doing nothing about it? Some management! Is he a manager or one of the boys and girls? Gosh, he has 12 lieutenants who are supposed to be in charge (supervise) of at least two other firefighters. However, they do not supervise, nor do they encourage minimization of overtime, because they are in fact “one of the boys and girls” and members of the union. More to come! This is simply too far over the top. We called attention to this situation a while back, and it seems that by not doing his job as the fire department manager, he had allowed over $100,000 in unnecessary fire department overtime costs to occur this year. From comments made at the budget workshop, the City Manager forced him to do his job. But, as expected, he said that public safety had been compromised.
2. To the posting that says everybody in all government's are corrupt, all we can say as an effort to inform the public of what needs fixing is that hope springs eternal in the breasts of all men. We will soldier on, and hope that we can make a difference. By the way, our reading is that if Commissioner Grasty can wean himself from the Diesen clique and support the Mayor and Commissioner Hathaway, who are making noises that they understand there is not going to be business as usual, the City Manager could get on with the business of repairing the City government before the November election. Of course, if there are newly elected commissioners in November, the winners will make these decisions. Nevertheless, Jack, you can make the difference now, and your decisions will greatly influence what happens for the next three months and possibly for many years to come. Jack, be the reform movement’s cut the spending hero!
3. The Planning and Zoning Board, which has brought you two proposed ordinances that seem off the wall, and it appears not even approved for their legality by our esteemed and overpaid City Attorney, has changed its mind, and not all of those that rammed it through and tried to make an issue this summer to divert your attention from the budget mess,support their own proposals. If the proponents are turning tail, what is this postponement all about? Will they flip-flop again after the election? Is that what the postponement was about? Lie today and pass it if we win in November?
DEAR JOHN
We know of the limited resources available to John Hagood, the City Manager, and to his inability to get all of the important letters written that he would like to send. So we decided to help him and provide him drafts that will simplify his tasks and free him up for important.
Memorandum
August 20, 2007
From: John Hagood, City Manger
TO: Vehicle maintenance supervisor
Please perform a complete cost/benefit analysis for purchasing Impalas versus Tahoes versus Crown Victorias. I am interested in reviewing the cost of acquisition, cost of operation and maintenance and fuel usage, and the salvage value.
Secondly, if 15 of the police pursuit vehicles were replaced with non-pursuit vehicles over the next five years with lower cost vehicles, what would be the savings in both purchase and operating costs?
And finally, if any of this information was requested or provided to Chief Pagano or Khalid before the budget exercise, please send me send me a copy of the information provided to them.
Thank you,
John
SPENDING CUTS—NEW MATH
The City of New Smyrna Beach is facing a revenue shortfall of over $2,300,000, and at the workshops held two weeks ago, the City Commission directed the City Manager to cut another 5% %, not from the spending budget but from the millage rate. This is a patent ploy to make it appear that additional spending cuts will be made but in reality no additional spending cuts are addressed but a raid on the current reserves because the millage rate reduction will only result in less revenue. To make up any revenue shortfall they will then steal from the unallocated equity fund, also known as reserves. At this point, there is no new proposal on the table, and there will be none unless changes are made between now and September 12, 2007, at the first required public hearing on the budget. We do not know where the 5% cuts will be proposed, but even a cursory examination of last years budget shows that large spending cuts can be made with relatively little pain to the community and little effect upon City services. The Shadow proposes the following:
FIRST do not build the needless fire house on the Putt Putt lot that will cost about $4,000,000 in capital costs and more than $350,000 in annual debt service costs without regard to utilities and maintenance costs. We think the City will lose money on the sale of the Putt-Putt property (they paid top dollar for the property and could not sell it today for what they paid), and would have to charge off part of the costs so far to the design. However, the design might be used for the Station near the K Mart, and the cost of refurbishing the Columbus Avenue station could be considered an offset for some of the savings accrued by not building the Third Avenue Station.
SECOND replace the fire department's union contract that provides a 3% multiplier for pension calculations; increase the percentage of contribution by the employee to the pension plan at least equivalent to police personnel contributions, and put in place deductions for the early retirement age of an employee. This can save millions. Each year the higher and overpaid fire department force replaces a low year of pay used in the calculation with a high year. Cindy Richenberg replaced a $36,000 year with a $$91,000 salary last year and will replace a $46,000 year with the same $91,000 this year. This is an increase of about $110,000 for these two years and the cost for future benefit contributions at 23 years of service for her for these two years under the contract is an increase of $15,000 of pension payout for the rest of her life. Just changing the multiplier rate from 3% to 2% would save that $15,000 annually for the next 30 to 40 years. By the way, it is what police personnel and fire personnel in the County receive.
THIRD do not give an across the board 3% salary increase to all City employees. Lower paid employees should have a cost of living increase, based on U.S. labor department figures, but giving this to those at the top end of the city payroll after the 6.5% provided last year is unconscionable. Last years increase covers inflation for both 2006 and 2007. It depends on what the cut point is, but 3% not paid to the highest paid employees could be as high as $150,000 (3% of half the salaries paid out).
FOURTH reclassify the position of “lieutenant” in the fire department. They are not supervisors or managers, they are rank and file union members, but are paid as supervisors. It would reduce the pay of all 12 personnel since they are paid extra as managers. It not only shows up as wages, but as benefits and increased pensions. Supervisors and managers are not members of a Union, they are management.
FIFTH the level of overtime at the fire and police departments is outrageous. This indicates either bad or poor management. The Fire department Chief complained that the City Manager had already reduced overtime by not backfilling those officers who called in sick with one that had to be paid time and a half when called in as a replacement. There would still be some overtime required, but if properly managed would be minimal.
SIXTH the management structure at the police department is nsupportable from an organizational theory point of view. The current structure was put into place to increase salaries as a reward for personnel, not because of additional responsibilities. After all, we have less than 60 personnel in the department. It is called grade creep. One Deputy Chief instead of four Commanders could save a lot of money, including three take home cars, and three positions valued at more than $300,000 annually even before other benefit costs. By the way, the ratio in the sworn officer category in the county Sheriff's office is 17 to 470 whereas the ratio here is 5 to 45 sworn officers??---you do the math.
SEVENTH the use of take home police cars for personnel that do not sleep in the City and paying the fuel to drive as far as 50 miles away is untenable and should be eliminated. We have previously shown the savings that could be realized from suspension of this practice. We have been informed that the car that slept in Pierson now sleeps in New Smyrna Beach. Where does this officer vote?
EIGHTH we have seen no cost benefit study that justifies the purchase of SUV's. Until it can be shown to be cost effective, do not buy another one, notwithstanding Chief Pagano’s subjective plea. That also applies to extra pursuit vehicles.
The new math also requires the City to enter into fanciful projections for the revenue from its enterprise operations and its other subsidized activities like the sports complex. The proposed budget was non-specific about some of these expenses. There are now four operating golf courses within the City limits of New Smyrna Beach, with a fifth to open soon. There is no question that the sport is suffering from a loss of players as well increased competition. The personnel costs for each of the neighboring privately owned golf courses are well below half of the Muni costs. The Water Taxis run by the Marine Discovery Center are not covering expenses and continue to draw down the federal grant provided by Congressman Mica to get it started. There is no “water taxi” reserve account, and the City Commission pledged not to spend taxpayer money to support this activity when the grant money was exhausted. However, with the new math who knows? The revenue projections are probably unrealistic, but there they sit as the staffs’ best estimate of future revenue. If, or when, they are not realized, the revenue loss and will probably increase the need for dipping further into the reserves.
“Best Blog of the Week”
(Edited for grammar and punctuation)
A POTPOURRI OF CITIZEN COMMENTS IS
AGAIN PROVIDED THIS WEEK IN ORDER
FOR YOU TO GET IN TUNE WITH THE
MOOD OF OUR READERS
* The latest blogs concern seems to be who is and who not part of the problem is. As an elected official, management, or employee conducting business for the tax payers, if you are not part of the solution, you are in turn part of the problem. The city budget has had items deleted. You can choose to believe they are reductions or a bloated request for funds. Tax payers should not have to guess about what has been done. If you just look around you'll find everything is all right with the town. Department heads continue to use SUV's, petrol, oil and insurance provided from tax revenue and Mr. Hagood and our city council does not seem to have a problem with this perk. In reality, this symbol of arrogance is a slap in the face of every day citizens that have to pay for their own auto and expenses. 700 or so golf course members enjoy the rigors of 18 holes, subsidized with your tax funds. This expense includes the husband of the Park and Recreation Dept that was hired without a search for the best candidate, at a reasonable salary. Even after several disciplines, he maintains his Tier 2 management status without a question to why this expense goes un-protested. This too seems to be all right with our city fathers. The remaining grant money funding the Water Taxi continues to trickle away, as if grant money is not funded by our tax structure. The Water Taxi may be waiting for the old high school to be converted so our school budget can pick up this funding. When is enough going to be enough? I hope voters are using facts, accounted for in the media and on the sites that have a different posture. An informed voter is an incumbent’s worst nightmare. I think this fall is when enough is enough. We need leaders to pilots the good ship NSB through the troubled times ahead not the BUSINESS AS USUAL CLUB!
* The epiphany of tax revolt has not been fully accepted by our city leaders. We are not going away anytime soon. The pie that is tax revenue, funded by hard working people, is not the chew toy of a new age politician. Hard core leaders of Business as Usual should know many of the tax payers are watching very careful where our money goes. Sunshine Laws and watchdogs are on the prowl. Watching the city SUV fleet parade down Canal Street only serves to inflame the citizens and the movement grows. Remember the posture of the politicians proudly anointing the two water taxis, like the second coming of the I-Me 1980's crowd. Flash forward to paying the toll for opulent waste of our years of windfall property tax. Squandered on the muni golf course and it's over paid staff, staffing city departments relentlessly and the icons of just plain bad behavior. Is this the lesson our children are going to take to future? Ken Taylor may not be the right candidate to lead us out of our slurry, but he may be the right start. New Smyrna’s tax revenue is only part of the problem. Unlike our current electorate, new politicians may provide the leadership to a new Florida. Do you want your children to inherit our failings or do they get the chance to see a bright future with reasonable in town employment, reasonable tax base for citizens or do we see more nepotism, status symbols, and the fleecing of administrative costs? Support Governor Crist! Your vote counts make our politicians get out of business as usual business!
Electric Rates
The City of Winter Park has a chart from the FEMA website on the front page of its website that shows the rate structure for several utilities serving Central Florida. Please note that the most expensive rate is New Smyrna Beach, brought to you by Jeanne Diesen and her mismanagement crew, a majority of Diesen, Para, and Spangler, the latter being the husband of Sally Mackay who is running for Mayor. Four years ago, before the City Commissioned passed Ordinance 19-05, and Mr. Rodi was hired, UCNSB had one of the lowest rate structures in the state. Guess who has been in your wallet. Bet you will not see this on the NSB website, and you must search for similar information on the UC website that shows a FEMA chart for the entire state of Florida, and that Fort Meade is the most expensive utility with Tallahassee second! LINK
GET A BACKBONE—REAL TAX CUTS
City Commissioners, under the prodding of the Mayor and Commissioner Hathaway, have actually taken the first baby steps toward spending cuts. What they have done so far, however, is really slight of hand minimal reductions, and doing deficit spending on part of the shortfall in revenue by stealing it from the reserve funds. At least cutting the millage rate is better than nothing, but not much. Even this modest cut flies in the face of their protests when they went to Tallahassee and claimed the sky was falling. Now the cuts they have accepted so far are mandated by the State legislature, as millage rate cuts, and although we thought this would result in them cutting spending, they did almost no cuts in spending and made up the difference as we just stated with reserve funds. On the surface they make it appear as an effort to respond to their constituents who are clamoring for property tax cuts, yet the reserves are previously collected property taxes. ....Peter's pocket to Paul's pocket comes to mind.
Moreover, they are not really cutting much. Consider that almost $400,000 is encompassed by at least $200,000 in reduced billings from the RCC, and abolishing positions previously held by Shannon Lewis and Frankie Robert. There appears to be a $2.3 million shortfall in revenue (see related article in this issue), and $400,000 was already accounted for by the above reductions. However, they are not really cutting much. Consider that almost $400,000 is encompassed by at least $200,000 in reduced billings from the RCC, and abolishing positions previously held by Shannon Lewis and Frankie Robert. There appears to be a $2.3 million shortfall in revenue (see related article in this issue), and $400,000 was already accounted for by the above reductions.
Instead of cutting big ticket items and saving the other $1.9 million, the intention is to raid the reserve fund for $1.1 million. This leaves only $800,000 to be cut at most from the proposed budget, which had hidden in it the base reductions of $400,000 referred to above. Not filling any vacancies for the rest of the year, removing a few of the lower paid jobs, and probably minor cuts that may not be noticed, are insignificant in the greater scheme of things. Moreover, everyday they do not change the pay and pension giveaway at the fire department is not only a charge against this year's budget but also a charge against every budget in the future. Look at just one employee. Cindy Richenberg. This year she is replacing a $46,000 year salary she was paid in 2002, with a $91,000 year with an increase in her pension base of $9,000 which will, with a multiplier of 3%, translate into an additional cost to the City of $2,700 each year for the rest of her life. Life expectancy is in the U.S. is estimated to be 77 years. In other words, each year she replaces a bad year with a good year could add up to, and we wish her a long life, more than $100,000. When her high five in three more years is $91,000, the total extra cost of her annuity will be over $500,000 more than it was in 2001. Reforming the fire and the police department management are also big items. Make them address these before September 12, or move out of town, if you can, before the next tax year.
We know these are tough decisions for politicians who want to be liked by everyone. Nevertheless, they got us into this financial mess, and now is the time for them to show some leadership and get us out of it. If they need a backbone, there are plenty of taxpayers who will help with the spinal implant. Force them to take a position and we can assure you that there will be marked differences between candidates and incumbents.
COLUMBUS AVENUE FIREHOUSE REVISITED
We published this article several months ago when it became apparent that none of the elected officials would address the unnecessary building of a new unneeded fire station. Given the rather heavy handed public relations employed by the Union to convince us that the Columbus Avenue station was uninhabitable and teeming with dangerous mold, we decided to reprint it again. In so doing we decided to call again upon the two knowledgeable citizens that had evaluated the facility we referred to in the article, and ask them how much it would cost to totally refurbish the living quarters and spruce up the rest of the place. Hold on to your hat! $25,000 they said and we gulped! Hey, that is a savings of $4, 925,000 by just not doing something stupid.
“The City Manager and his bosses, the City Commission, should rethink the validity of the justification for spending $5 million plus on a new Third street Fire Station. There is none! Especially in a time when money is scarce. They need to take a position that supports the best interest of their constituency for a change, and not the Fire Department lobby. No one has suggested that a run down fire station be rebuilt. Nor has any one suggested that adequate fire and police service be compromised. The first issue is whether the Columbus Avenue fire house should be expanded and refurbished or whether a new fire house should be built elsewhere at greater expense. The second issue concerns the definition of adequate service, whether the objective is realistic, and whether the taxpayers are willing to fund that level of service. Thus the question becomes, is it more practical and economical to up-grade an existing facility or remove a valuable piece of property from the tax rolls, (already done) losing tax revenue, to meet an objective that may not save more lives and is terribly expensive? There
is no evidence that supports the claim of saving more lives. Few people, who live on Columbus Avenue, if any, moved there before the fire station was established and few can complain that they were not aware of the additional noise associated with living next to a fire station. The only additional noise is when the engine comes and goes, sometimes with siren and lights, but mostly without. The Shadow is privy to an inspection tour recently made by two of our concerned citizens during the middle of the day. There was no fire truck, no one staffing the station, the doors were wide open, and there was no indication that the fire truck and crew were on a fire fighting sortie, or a doughnut run. It was the impression of these citizens that refurbishing and upgrading this station could easily satisfy fire department needs, as opposed to building a new Taj Mahal station, as does the School Board.
It is time for our Commissioners to get off the pot, so to speak, and start leading the City staff toward frugality and the cost effective expenditure of our tax money. The Mayor is in that absurd news clip trying to show that the Columbus Avenue Station had not been repaired, but his only contribution seems to have been to agree that construction will begin in November for the needless new station. This project is in your zone Mr. Richenberg, why don't you show us what you are made of and take the lead, or would that cause problems at home?”
RESERVES
Reserves are taxes or other revenues, like in a condominium, where money is put aside for specific purposes, such as known contingencies of replacing a roof and unknown contingencies such as damage from a hurricane or other unknown but possible emergencies. It does not matter who collects the money and whether it is a government entity or a private business. Money is collected from the current owners, or in the case of government, taxpayers, and put aside, or held in reserve. Hopefully it is invested wisely and liquid, meaning that you can access it quickly. It is supposed to be in a “lock box” and not spent, borrowed or used for any purpose not originally collected. Unfortunately, at the Federal level, the Social Security lock box is full of Federal Government IOUs, not certificates of deposit, but that is another matter. Unfortunately, it suggests to local governments that the rules for not using the money as intended carries only the penalty imposed by voters, if by chance, they become informed that it was spent for unintended purposes.
Now the collection of reserves is similar to the concept of “airplane maintenance.” This concept requires that for every hour the aircraft is in service, a previously calculated amount of money is credited to and is accumulated in various maintenance accounts, so that when the need arises to repair or replace the aircraft, the owner has the money in the bank to pony up the full cost. Of course, some aircraft owners, as do many condominium associations, do not collect funds and save for anticipated replacement of things that have known limited lifetimes or other contingencies. Therefore, they do not have money in the bank to pay for these items when they require replacement, or unanticipated repairs are required, and assessments must be made of all owners at the time funds are required. We call that SHORTSIGHTEDNESS! Some condominiums do this deliberately so that old owners pay less and new owners get stuck with higher assessments.
Under the reserve theory, all taxes or revenues exceeding expenditures are placed in a reserve account, which in our case is called the unallocated equity fund. It is a contingency fund, or if you wish, a rainy day fund. Years ago, reserves, or sinking funds as they are called, were used to buy or pay for capital items such as police cars, roads, or bridge replacements. Some older taxpayers, transient property owners, and governments clearly prefer SHORTSIGHTEDNESS, since they may not be in New Smyrna Beach or in office when the bridge fails, or the roof blows away. They live in the moment because they and their governments were not encouraged to be frugal and financially responsible. They also only buy ripe bananas. However, many older taxpayers may not be able to payout huge assessments, and therefore see the advantage of airplane maintenance even though their government or condominium association did not collect enough and save for a rainy day.
Laws and ordinances have addressed some of these issues and, in the case of condominiums; they are required to have certain minimum reserves. Cities on the other hand, usually set their own policy on reserves. In New Smyrna Beach, this has been the equivalent of three months annual budget expenditure level, roughly one quarter of the FY 2007 budget of almost $50 million ---$12 million. With the new bond issue, it seems that our total budget is pegged at around $73 million meaning that under the City's policy, the reserve should grow to around $18 million. It will be reduced to under $11 million if they do not cut spending. Are they changing their policy? The refuge they took from their policy, was that the City no longer needed a big reserve.
This is the plan. The City Commission will deplete our reserve, or rainy day fund to avoid making spending cuts. At least that is what it looks like to the Shadow. We believe the marching orders to cut 10% on the millage rate is a sham and is insufficient, does not get the job done, and is not in the spirit of the Governor's reduced spending plan.
Again, here is how it will work. They claim to be cutting 10%, but that is only on the ad valorem tax side, which is a total collection of $12 million. Therefore, we only need to cut $1.2 million, and we make up the revenue shortfall of $1.1 million from the reserve fund, since we already have built in savings from the departure of Shannon Lewis and Frankie Robert last year, being billed at least $200,000 less from the badly managed RCC, the remaining $800,000 will probably show up as deferred charges that will show up in 2009 (Wow, a silk purse out of a sow’s ear).
We have provided a link to the last audio tape at the workshop hearing on
the proposed budget. We think that that their words mean almost nothing, and they We have provided a link to the last audio tape at the workshop hearing on the proposed budget. We now find that their words mean almost nothing, and why are they still planning to provide a 3% increase for all employees, buy an untold number of cell phones, and purchase $2000 worth of kitchen equipment for the new fire station. LINK We initially thought it meant they would make $2.7 million in real spending cuts, that would start with a new contract reforming fire department pensions, and both fire and police department management structures, or lack thereof. They will not even take a position on the needless construction of an unnecessary fire station. There are no significant cuts in spending, and they think the taxpayers are apathetic or too dense to figure it out. Are they correct?
FYI, definition of a sinking fund:
A Sinking Fund was a device used in Great Britain in the 18th century to reduce national debt. While used by Robert Walpole in 1716 and effectively in the 1720s and early 1730s, it originated in the commercial tax syndicates of the Italian peninsula of the 14th century to retire redeemable public debt of those cities.
The fund received whatever surplus occurred in the national Budget each year. However, the problem was that the fund was rarely given any priority in Government strategy. The result of this was that the fund was often raided by the Treasury when they needed funds quickly.
Does this sound familiar?
NSB Department Responses 14% Tax Cuts
We have obtained, and are presenting as a link, the proposals for how each city department head would reduce spending by 14% in the coming fiscal year. The City Manager early in the budget preparation process made the request when the exact level of rollback was unknown. In the coming weeks, we will analyze each of these submissions, and provide you with our comments. As a preliminary matter, it is our opinion that if a supervisor, manager, or director in any major corporation had the temerity to turn in a statement that does not reflect how he would save money when asked to do so, and only offers four pages of possibilities, he/she would have it returned with a note to do as they were told, or their replacement would. Not only did the Fire Chief ignore the assignment, he included in his submission potential reductions that he should have implemented long ago, such as not allowing fire department personnel to abuse sick leave. Here are the links to some of the proposed budget cuts. FIRE POLICE PARKS CRA HR
Watch the NON-TAX Cutters
There is only one bouncing ball before you now: spending cuts. The staff and City Commission to date have not recommended serious cuts nor have they addressed the major drain on current and future budgets. Stop the project to build a needless fire station that adds nothing but financial burden to the City, and redo the disastrous fire department union contract regarding pay and pensions. Abolish the position of Lieutenant at the fire department. This can be accomplished unilaterally under the current contract. Direct the Police Chief to reorganize his department to effect a rational management structure supervisory. That is the bouncing ball. The so-called beach ordinances advanced by Randy are deliberate distractions, to divert your attention from the need for serious spending cuts. The fact is that his wife earns $91, 880 in salary annually, and an additional $63,000 in benefits paid by the City. She is the poster child for what is wrong. Her PIO designation costs the City about $13,000 annually, for a position that is considered “overtime.” If the City Manager and/or the City Commissioners do not have the intestinal fortitude to tell the Fire Chief to knock it off, at least they can arrange for her to perform the function without paying overtime.
CANDIDATES AND THEIR POSITIONS ON ISSUES
We have decided to frame issues that candidates for public office must address, and from their public statements and/or websites determine their views on these and other issues of importance to them. So far, we have Mayor Vandergrift's public statement, particularly at the budget meetings last week and the Town Meeting held last Saturday where he discussed at length the Municipal Golf Course and its problems. Frankly, we were disappointed that Sally Mackay who attended most of these meeting made no comment on any of the issues and stated no positions. We expected to read her position on these issues when her long awaited website was activated. That did not happen; there was nothing of substance, just platitudes.
Our method of determining a candidates stated position on any issue, we admit we will be somewhat subjective. We doubt that any of the candidates will provide the Shadow with definitive statements, which we would, of course, welcome. We expect that such determinations will be left to our own devices. We are looking for two answers, YES or NO, and will treat waffling as a NO. The web site put up by Sally Mackay, unfortunately, takes no position on any issue, hopefully that will change. This City has real problems, and they will not be served by allowing the candidates to dodge the issues.
We welcome our readers’ assistance in ferreting out their positions, and expect that there will be at least two contested elections and possibly three. We do not know whether those running will support Governor Crist’s tax reduction concept, or just spew non-specific pabulum about how they support some vague tax cutting proposal that will be hard to define if they are elected. We have watched two of the incumbents, the Mayor and Vice Mayor Hathaway. They seem to have heard the voters, responded to information disseminated to the voters, decided that some spending cuts makes sense, and that they can be accomplished without reducing services that the public wants to remain in place. The proof of their understanding and willingness to support their constituents will be seen if they reverse some of the salary and pension excesses they put in place when times were good, now that times and revenues are not so good.
