Council starts taking ax to city budget

City Council members talked cuts Tuesday afternoon during a special called meeting on the city's budget.

Some of them were major.

"We have a responsibility to dig and dig deep," Councilwoman Deborah Scott told council members. "We need to come up with a budget we can afford, not what we want."

Council members talked for an hour about department budgets, and three council members proposed a series of cuts to help trim a proposed property tax increase by Mayor Ron Littlefield. Councilwoman Deborah Scott suggested the most major trims, saying the city should look at shuttering Memorial Auditorium, cutting Outdoor Chattanooga, combining the Department of Parks and Recreation with the Department of Arts, Education & Culture and selling the Chattanoogan hotel.

Mr. Littlefield said afterward he realized the council was "coming to grips" with the fact there is no easy way to cut the city's budget. He said closing Memorial Auditorium was a "little extreme," and it would be hard to sell the Chattanoogan in the current economic climate.

He said he gave a responsible budget to the council that did not include bells and whistles.

"Major cuts, in my opinion, are not responsible," he said.

PROTEST AND SPECIFICS

The mayor proposed a property tax increase of 64 cents per every $100 of assessed value two weeks ago to fund a $198.6 million budget for the 2010-2011 fiscal year. The council is considering that proposal as it tries to make a June 30 deadline for passing a city budget.

Mark West, president of the Chattanooga Tea Party, helped lead a 50-person-strong protest outside the council building Tuesday. He said the panel was heading in the right direction with cuts.

"They need to do that," he said. "They can't come to the taxpayer, who's their employer, and say we need a raise."

Other council members also proposed cuts. Councilwoman Pam Ladd proposed eliminating the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, cleaning on every other day, reducing heating, air conditioning and lighting at the City Council building and City Hall, giving no pay raises to city employees, giving incentives for only those employees who make less than $50,000 a year and maintaining the existing cuts to Parks and Recreation.

Councilman Jack Benson gave his own list of cuts including a five percent reduction in city-funded agencies, canceling or delaying capital projects, incrementally funding a post-employment retirement benefit and reducing the council's and administration's budgets by 5 percent.

He also suggested ending take-home car privileges, and he said any city policeman is welcome to park their car at his house.

"If people are living outside the city, they need to park their car at the border," he said.

CAUTIOUS APPROACH

Councilmen Russell Gilbert and Peter Murphy took a more cautious approach, saying there could be causes and effects with the decisions made.

"Do we have a dollar amount tagged onto what we could cut?" Mr. Gilbert asked fellow council members.

He said he didn't want to have to come back next year for more cuts and also dilute some city services.

"I understand wanting to make cuts, but there is a reaction to these cuts," Mr. Gilbert said.

Ms. Ladd said she thought cutting agencies would reduce the budget by $2 million. Mr. Benson said he thought his cuts would bring the proposed property tax increase down to about 30 cents per $100 of assessed value.

Mr. Murphy said he believed in efficiency and said the city could look at buying technologies that could reduce staffing levels and not have to pay salary and benefits. He said the city needs to be careful about what it does.

"I don't think our citizens want us to run off a cliff," he said.