Budget Deadlines Approaching
Colleagues are emailing me news articles from all across the State and Country about the latest City, County or State that is attempting to solve their budget crisis. Riverside County is the latest to join the news blitz, with their announcement that they'll be laying off more than 1000 employees if they can't get their employees to reduce their total compensation. You can read more about it here, and the labor union reaction here.
Riverside County's story is no different than the rest of us, with decreasing revenues and ever increasing costs for salaries, medical benefits and pensions. To quote one member of the Board of Supervisors:
"...In a county with an almost 13 percent jobless rate, "we have to realize how relatively (well off) we are," Buster said. He said the county needs the unions' cooperation in balancing its budget: "We don't want to do that by laying people off..."
Labor's reaction, not surprisingly is as follows:
...In tough economic times, "pensions are attractive targets for budget cutting, but it should be the last priority," said Jim Cunningham, executive director of the Riverside Sheriff's Association, which represents most of the county's deputies, district attorney's investigators, coroner's investigators and probation officers ---- more than 3,300 in all.
The members would be "vehemently opposed to any attack on the (current) pension plan," he said, suggesting supervisors instead tap into the reserve fund, which now stands at about $98 million. That account already is expected to be drawn down $30 million in the coming fiscal year, according to the county's mid-year budget report, which was released Feb. 3.
Supervisors also have talked about across-the-board pay cuts of 5 percent or more, but Cunningham says that assumes all county departments are equally important. They're not, he says, citing the planning department as an example of a department that has a "far lower" priority than policing. In a rough economy, he notes, crime typically rises and the current sheriff, Stanley Sniff, "runs a lean ship already..."
Manteca's situation is not much different. We are working very hard to minimize the budget's impact on both services and our employees, but at the end of the day, our final budget will be very dependent on our employee's willingness to acknowledge that we are now in very different times. Salaries, benefits and pensions all need to be analyzed in light of current and future revenue constraints.
Riverside County's story is no different than the rest of us, with decreasing revenues and ever increasing costs for salaries, medical benefits and pensions. To quote one member of the Board of Supervisors:
"...In a county with an almost 13 percent jobless rate, "we have to realize how relatively (well off) we are," Buster said. He said the county needs the unions' cooperation in balancing its budget: "We don't want to do that by laying people off..."
Labor's reaction, not surprisingly is as follows:
...In tough economic times, "pensions are attractive targets for budget cutting, but it should be the last priority," said Jim Cunningham, executive director of the Riverside Sheriff's Association, which represents most of the county's deputies, district attorney's investigators, coroner's investigators and probation officers ---- more than 3,300 in all.
The members would be "vehemently opposed to any attack on the (current) pension plan," he said, suggesting supervisors instead tap into the reserve fund, which now stands at about $98 million. That account already is expected to be drawn down $30 million in the coming fiscal year, according to the county's mid-year budget report, which was released Feb. 3.
Supervisors also have talked about across-the-board pay cuts of 5 percent or more, but Cunningham says that assumes all county departments are equally important. They're not, he says, citing the planning department as an example of a department that has a "far lower" priority than policing. In a rough economy, he notes, crime typically rises and the current sheriff, Stanley Sniff, "runs a lean ship already..."
Manteca's situation is not much different. We are working very hard to minimize the budget's impact on both services and our employees, but at the end of the day, our final budget will be very dependent on our employee's willingness to acknowledge that we are now in very different times. Salaries, benefits and pensions all need to be analyzed in light of current and future revenue constraints.
Labels: Budget
posted by City Manager @ 3:58 AM
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