City Makes Budget Cuts in Response to State Raid of Vehicle License Fees
If all goes as planned, the City of Menifee will host fewer city council meetings, fewer planning commission meetings, possibly even a morat...
http://www.menifee247.com/2011/10/city-makes-budget-cuts-in-response-to.html
If all goes as planned, the City of Menifee will host fewer city council meetings, fewer planning commission meetings, possibly even a moratorium on hiring new staff, among other cuts, in an attempt to close a $3.9 million gap left by the State.
The city had actually balanced its budget last June, but was blindsided shortly thereafter when Governor Brown signed legislation allowing the State to seize $3.9 million of its vehicle license fees. That money represented about 16% of the city's total budget.
The City of Menifee had made attempts to capture that money back from the State but was unsuccessful. Finally last Tuesday, the city council adopted several budget cuts to balance out the $3.9 million in seized funds.
However, none of the cuts will have a direct impact on residents' existing quality of life. Instead, the city was able to find money to offset the $3.9 million by tightening the belt at City Hall a little tighter.
For example, scheduling one city council meeting and one planning commission meeting a month, instead of two, would add another $28,000 towards closing the gap left by the State.
The city found it could renegotiate contracts with its city attorney, its copier contract, their long-distance telephone contract, among others, and found $219,000 they could squeeze out. Even renegotiating contracts with the County Sheriff and Fire, without sacrificing service levels, the city could find additional savings at $716,000. "There was no contract too big or too small that we couldn't look at." Rawlings said.
The city also owes about $1.1 million to the County of Riverside for public services the County provided while the city was in its infancy. Currently, the city is paying $367,000 a year towards that debt. Rawlings and his staff was able to negotiate the County into deferring those payments to another five years.
They also "resized" the city's events, such as the City Birthday Event, Independence Day Celebration, effectively saving another $295,000.
The city also chose to forego plans to expand the facilities at City Hall, and eliminate additional staff training and travel.
With all the cuts, the city still found itself $514,000 short of closing the $3.9 million gap. To make up that last bit of difference, it will take money from its cash reserves.
The city had also proposed a hiring freeze to help close the gap. When the city adopted its budget last June, it had set aside money to hire as many as eight new positions, but considered putting those positions on the shelf in the mean time. However, city councilmembers felt they could actually build new revenue by filling some key positions, and opted to fund those positions through the city's cash reserves.
"I would be in favor of taking money out of the reserves", Councilmember Darcy Kuenzi said in regards to keeping the eight new positions open. "I think some of the service levels in the department are deficient, in my opinion, and they should be increased, and we need to increase the staff so that we can have an adequate level of service for code enforcement, engineering and public works departments, adding to the economic development by adding those positions."
Councilmember Sue Kristjansson added, "Regardless of the funding, when you have a very minimal staff trying to do an enormous job, morale tanks and people burn out. I want to be very judicious with the money that is spent here, but I don't want to tax our employees any more than they already are, because we might just get them to that brink."
In regards to having only one city council and planning commission meeting per month, councilmember John Denver added that the city be allowed to schedule additional meetings if the workload requires it. "If there's a need for a second planning commission meeting in a month, because they've been given another assignment, and/or if a large group of things come in, it would be placed in." Denver said.
The city had actually balanced its budget last June, but was blindsided shortly thereafter when Governor Brown signed legislation allowing the State to seize $3.9 million of its vehicle license fees. That money represented about 16% of the city's total budget.
The City of Menifee had made attempts to capture that money back from the State but was unsuccessful. Finally last Tuesday, the city council adopted several budget cuts to balance out the $3.9 million in seized funds.
However, none of the cuts will have a direct impact on residents' existing quality of life. Instead, the city was able to find money to offset the $3.9 million by tightening the belt at City Hall a little tighter.
For example, scheduling one city council meeting and one planning commission meeting a month, instead of two, would add another $28,000 towards closing the gap left by the State.
The city found it could renegotiate contracts with its city attorney, its copier contract, their long-distance telephone contract, among others, and found $219,000 they could squeeze out. Even renegotiating contracts with the County Sheriff and Fire, without sacrificing service levels, the city could find additional savings at $716,000. "There was no contract too big or too small that we couldn't look at." Rawlings said.
The city also owes about $1.1 million to the County of Riverside for public services the County provided while the city was in its infancy. Currently, the city is paying $367,000 a year towards that debt. Rawlings and his staff was able to negotiate the County into deferring those payments to another five years.
They also "resized" the city's events, such as the City Birthday Event, Independence Day Celebration, effectively saving another $295,000.
The city also chose to forego plans to expand the facilities at City Hall, and eliminate additional staff training and travel.
With all the cuts, the city still found itself $514,000 short of closing the $3.9 million gap. To make up that last bit of difference, it will take money from its cash reserves.
The city had also proposed a hiring freeze to help close the gap. When the city adopted its budget last June, it had set aside money to hire as many as eight new positions, but considered putting those positions on the shelf in the mean time. However, city councilmembers felt they could actually build new revenue by filling some key positions, and opted to fund those positions through the city's cash reserves.
"I would be in favor of taking money out of the reserves", Councilmember Darcy Kuenzi said in regards to keeping the eight new positions open. "I think some of the service levels in the department are deficient, in my opinion, and they should be increased, and we need to increase the staff so that we can have an adequate level of service for code enforcement, engineering and public works departments, adding to the economic development by adding those positions."
Councilmember Sue Kristjansson added, "Regardless of the funding, when you have a very minimal staff trying to do an enormous job, morale tanks and people burn out. I want to be very judicious with the money that is spent here, but I don't want to tax our employees any more than they already are, because we might just get them to that brink."
In regards to having only one city council and planning commission meeting per month, councilmember John Denver added that the city be allowed to schedule additional meetings if the workload requires it. "If there's a need for a second planning commission meeting in a month, because they've been given another assignment, and/or if a large group of things come in, it would be placed in." Denver said.
