Councilwoman Deborah Scott presented a budget Tuesday with no property tax increase and a caveat: if the city wants to fund retirement medical benefits, it should sell a golf course to fund it.
"I think we should liquidate a nonessential item to finance it, and the sooner the better," she said.
PDF: Scott budget
Council members took most of the day Tuesday to look at cuts to a proposed 64-cent-per-$100-of-assessed-value property tax increase. Mayor Ron Littlefield proposed the 33 percent tax hike almost a month ago to fund a $198.6 million budget, more than $32 million than last year's budget.
Controversy has stemmed from the proposal, and now council members find themselves looking at ways to pare down the budget to either no tax increase or something that is tolerable to the general public.
Mrs. Scott handed out her budget late Tuesday afternoon that included no salary increases, except to fix a Chattanooga Police Department pay anomaly, furloughs or hour reductions to achieve fiscal goals and major cuts to the city's Parks and Recreation Department.
Not all council members were sold on the idea. Councilman Peter Murphy said one of the biggest drawbacks from the recession has been the real estate market. He said he did not know if the city could make a profit selling a golf course.
"You're not going to get a lot of money for it," he said. "Not in this market."
Councilman Jack Benson said the city has taken on properties over the course of time, and it may be time to put one of them on the market. The city has a total of three golf courses, officials said.
"It's about time we start looking at selling one of these courses," he said.
Council members took several minutes discussing cuts, employee benefits and funding city agencies. Council members decided that four agencies -- the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Bicentennial Library, the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Regional Planning Agency, the Air Pollution Control Board and the Tennessee Riverpark -- all needed to be funded as fully as possible.
All other agencies could be looked at and cut, council members decided.
Daisy Madison, the city's chief financial officer, also told council members that if they decided to cut off city retirement medical benefits to employees not now vested in the program then a savings of $5.4 million could be achieved in the 2010-2011 fiscal year budget.
A discussion also took place about employee take-home cars. Doing away with all such vehicles would save $1.5 million a year, officials said. Most council members said they would like to see only sworn police and fire personnel keep those vehicles. City officials said there would be about $43,500 in savings if that were to happen.
WHAT'S NEXTThe City Council will meet at 1 p.m. Tuesday to discuss the budget. It also will meet from 9 a.m. to noon Wednesday and from 9 a.m. to noon Friday.
Councilwoman Carol Berz, chairwoman of the Budget, Personnel and Finance Committee, said the city would keep looking at cuts next week in three different sessions.
She said there has been no council member who has expressed an interest in the 64-cent-per-$100-of-assessed-value property tax hike.
"I think we all agree the 33 percent increase is much more than we'll support," she said.
Dan Johnson, chief of staff for Mayor Ron Littlefield, said the administration did not think the council would stomach the increase.
"We were fully expecting there would be cuts from that," he said.