A week from city budget crunch time, Morgan Hill officials picked apart the 40-page budget reduction strategy until it was nearly unrecognizable.
True to the sustainable budget principles they re-adopted in November, nothing was off the table during the Morgan Hill City Council's second workshop Wednesday night: not even characteristics of the sustainable principles upon which the strategy before them was based. Councilwoman Marilyn Librers floated the idea of a no layoff policy, while Councilmen Greg Sellers and Larry Carr and Mayor Steve Tate considered spending down the reserves from their agreed-upon 25 percent of a year's revenues to 15 percent.
The sustainable budget principles include keeping healthy reserves and considering all options, including layoffs. Faced with declines in property and sales tax revenues and development-related fees, the city is considering how to close an expected $2.2 million deficit each year for the next five years; City Manager Ed Tewes's recommendations include 13 layoffs and cutting back community services like environmental programs.
Each of the five councilmembers jockeyed for particular city services they'd like to remain intact: for Councilwoman Marby Lee and Tate, it was the police department. City Manager Ed Tewes recommends cutting one vacant officer position and trading two others for municipal service officers, which would save money but leave fewer officers for responding to violent cases.
Tate and Carr held fast to the environmental programs division, which would be reduced from the community's pride and joy - Morgan Hill is a regional leader in environmental programs - to a barebones operation maintaining state and federal mandates only by eliminating most educational aspects and laying off its primary cheerleader, coordinator Rebecca Fotu.
"I do not want to give up on that," Tate said of the division. "I'm looking at all this stuff coming down, federal and state mandates. Right now, we're ahead, we're doing things to achieve those things now. I just don't know how it's going to happen other than at the local level. I'm not willing to give up there."
Carr agreed, saying it's "far more beneficial" to stay ahead now than "playing catch-up later."
Meanwhile, Councilwoman Marby Lee was ready to roll up her sleeves and make decisions, reminding her colleagues that, with the exception of the police department, a lot of the services they were talking about weren't necessary city functions and they adopted a schedule that included a final decision Jan. 14.
City Manager Ed Tewes - who, along with his staff, penned the five-year plan before the council - reminded the council that the strategy, the one they were having trouble coming to terms with, is child's play compared with the situation they'd be facing if they had fewer reserves now. Reserves are what allow the council time to deliberate, he said, and there would be no so-called "soft landing" without a cushion.
Yet councilmembers seemed willing to turn the strategy on its head, bringing in ideas including spending down reserves, stretching out the plan from five years to seven or eight and looking anywhere and everywhere to save money without laying city workers off.
Librers, a former Parks and Recreation Commissioner, was OK with letting park grass die and even selling one of the two low-use parks. She also wanted to see fees for reserving park tables and community center meeting rooms upped, but didn't want to see layoffs in the Recreation and Community Services Department or elsewhere in the city.
About 40 people attended the meeting, mostly city employees, and two of the three public speakers work for the city.
The cost of doing absolutely nothing is light as a feather at first: spending down reserves from 44 percent to 34 percent by June, according to a comparison graph included in the strategy. But status quo-spending would leave a 21 percent reserve in 18 months, and no reserves at all in five years, according to the graph.
Based on the wide ranging suggestions of the council, Tewes said he was preparing a different budget reduction strategy for Wednesday's final meeting. The new strategy will allow "a la carte" decision making, with the council picking and choosing their options in different categories rather than adopting the recommendations in one fell swoop.
Rather than ordering up the day's special, the council will have three options to choose from in several different "packages," or groupings. For example, one grouping may be labeled the Streetlights Package, with three options: the first being Tewes's recommendation to turn off two-thirds of the residential streetlights; the second being a viable but less desired option, like using redevelopment agency funds to replace streetlights with more efficient LED lights in the RDA area; and a third, even less viable option, such as foregoing a decision while other options are studied.
Since there were "about 45 individual decisions" discussed Wednesday night, Tewes said he would group together like options to make Jan. 14's budget decisions more palatable.
Natalie Everett
Natalie Everett Natalie Everett is the education and city reporter for The Times. Reach her at (408) 779-4106, ext. 201, or neverett@morganhilltimes.com.
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