Mayor still pushing for City Council to change vote on tax reciprocity …
The Blade has a pdf of a memo sent from the Mayor to all Toledo City Council members where he is urging them to take action on Tuesday on three specific items:
1. Exigency on PERS Rollback for 12 months – $4.57 million in savings
2. Tax reciprocity – $3.2 million in revenue
3. Trash Fee Increase – $1.6 million in revenue. If no action is taken by May 1, the fee will decrease and create a larger budget gap.
The Blade pdf does not include the attached material that the Mayor referenced, but I am fairly confident that this, You know who you are is the editorial the Mayor is referring to from the Columbus Dispatch and this appears to be the referenced piece written by John Lyall who is the president of Ohio Council 8 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, AFL-CIO.
I’m a numbers person, so I ran through the numbers being thrown about:
$20.8 million budget deficit.
Potential savings:
$4.57 million PERS
$3.20 million tax reciprocity
$1.60 million garbage fee/tax
$6.28 million laying off 150 employees
Total savings: $16.65 million
They still have over $4 million to bridge, and yet the 3 proposal Carty has put out seem to be an either/or with laying off employees. Seems to me both are necessary in order to fix this massive hole. When is someone going to admit how bad this really is?
April 27th, 2009 at 6:18 pmI don’t think this is an either or, I think it’s an “in addition to” the layoffs. At least that’s how I understood it.
April 27th, 2009 at 6:25 pmFace it, this is “duh mayer’s” last fight and he means to make it a good one, a union busting one.
So, okay I’ll play along:
What are the final numbers for 2008 and THAT hole in the Fudge-it?
How is 1Q 2009’s income vs. spending going? Are on, above or below the projections?
It matters not, because “duh mayer” is intent on laying off cops and taking back the employee co-pays plus another 10% that he readily went along with when he had the money to spend on HIS pet projects.
Oh, and there’s that other pesky refusing to face reality and to prioritise the delivery of essential services vs. those pet projects of HIS, which always seem to have been funded.
A reality show this is not.
More like a very bad “B” movie…
HT/”Z”
April 27th, 2009 at 8:54 pmI just cannot believe that we’re losing so many police officers, including those in the schools, while the flowers along Reynolds Road and the Trail are being so beautifully maintained. I doubt very seriously that functioning, built-in sprinkler-sytems are high on most residents’ list of necessities. While we are taxed over and over on our utilities and trash fees, where is the money coming to pay those utility bills?
April 27th, 2009 at 9:32 pmMy water bill runs an avg of $80 a month……And its just sprinklers for grass and household usage!
Suzanne wrote:
April 27th, 2009 at 10:02 pmgrrr…..I hope to heck that City Council maintains their resolve. As I have said to my council person, this will be the straw the breaks the camels back for my family.
Additionally, are the “concessions” that are being asked for the union temporary…ie “a year concession” to get through the rough patch..while the revenue enhancements will be permanent?
grrr.
April 27th, 2009 at 11:49 pmlisarenee -
who does that OPERS rollback affect. according to the numbers you crunched earlier in the year the OPERS for all of the contracts you could identify was a much larger number ($21 million or so?!). seems this 4.57 million must affect only low hanging fruit.
April 28th, 2009 at 8:36 amZimmy, part of that is related to how the positions are funded, any PERS that doesn’t come out of the general fund doesn’t appear to be included, which it should be. If they are going to cut PERS they should cut them for everyone. One large example, anyone paid out of the water department, if their PERS was reduced/cut that would not impact the general fund, but it would be fair and would create more funding in these other accounts. Granted, that won’t help the deficit since the money can’t be transferred, but that’s why there is a discrepancy in funding.
April 28th, 2009 at 10:07 amright, i understand fund accounting, but who DOES that 4.57 affect? are all OPERS that come out of the general fund being cut or only specific contracts that they feel they can get away with doing? i absolutely agree that no matter the source or fund of the OPERS “pick-up” it should be cut uniformly – most city employees understand and agree to it but won’t give in if other unions/contracts are not included.
(i know it is not the unions’ or employees’ “fault” but they are the beneficiaries of compensation that our elected officials should never have given away in the first place – inevitably leading to budget problems)
by cutting so many police, it seems likely carty is trying to drive a wedge between police and fire so that they turn on each other and both wind up giving in on OPERS. the ability to save jobs is based on the ability to cut OPERS which drives a wedge between newer and older employees as well.
the changing dynamics of news and media leaves no one entity in the position to do the full story here – political dynamics that led to these problems, sources/restrictions of funds, how other cities and the courts are ruling on these issues (we are not alone in these problems but we sure feel isolated don’t we), comparable payroles and benefits for various departments across the city and across the nation, etc.
its blind people and the elephant, the forest from the trees; use whatever metaphor you like but without a comprehensive investigation, pols and unions are just kicking this thing down the road and the public is left skratching their collective heads.
April 28th, 2009 at 11:15 amFrom how I understand it, only positions funded from the General Fund are included in the Mayor’s numbers of the savings from the 12 month cut to PERS. It could also be lower because it might not include the full year for 2009 since payments can’t be taken back.
April 28th, 2009 at 11:17 am