The decision to hire the new fire fighters was forwarded to the Finance committee for consideration this past Wed. The finance committee talked about it and decided that the whole Council needed to take this decision so we voted out a recommendation supporting the hire to the entire Council. To this end, there is a special meeting Monday night at 7:30.
Another item that came up for discussion were the budget cuts handed down by the General Assembly. The GA cut the amount of money they send to localities and sent us suggested cuts. The biggest cuts are in police spending and spending on programs for at-risk youth. Spending on police is, of course, discretionary but spending on the at-risk stuff is mandated however, the General Assembly, in their wisdom, declined to rescind the mandated spending. The net effect of this is the state is transferring its budget problems to the localities. The total cut to the City is about $150k and what the Council will probably do is just take $150k out of the fund balance and plug the gap. I think that this is a mistake. If the state wants to cut the budget, they should go ahead and cut it.
Sending a recommendation to the localities to cut spending on police and at-risk youth is a time-honored tactic to ensure the cuts won’t actually happen.
August 11, 2008 at 11:12 am
Andy, what’s the subject line reference to “Firehouses”???
August 11, 2008 at 11:24 am
Maybe it should have been firefighters and finances…:)
August 12, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Okay, was just thinking perhaps the subject of a new Firehouse or second Firehouse had come up.