Budget reductions, Missing Data

12/3/09

Regarding the proposed budget decreases from the 1/12/09 minutes staff reported that to accommodate the expected loss of revenue they have proposed over $200,000.00 in budget cuts or a 14% Reduction.

Here are some of the proposed reductions and what has taken place over the year.  The most interesting proposed reduction was the limit to two special meetings a month.  This would have limited Mayor Andrew Kauffman to about $3,900 this year instead of the now $13,000 he is on track to make.  Although I don't recall the council actually voting on the proposed reductions, at the 2/9 meeting the council added back a portion of the staff training, per staff request, by a vote of the Council.  How can he be prepared for all of these "meetings" on top of his full time job?  Some cities have limitations on what can be billed, the council could also reduce their own pay by vote, which would be effective under a new council in 2011 or reduce their pay voluntarily by not billing for every "meeting".  That was one excuse by Mayor Kauffman, is that a current council can't change their pay.  This is correct, however he doesn't have to try and bill for every "meeting" he attends.

Proposed Reductions:
Specific budget reductions throughout the city
1. Employees have volunteered to forego any pay increase in 2009 $25,903 (This was done after giving large increases; a couple of 10% increases and a 19% increase last year
2. Reduce training for staff and council $8,000 (They added back $6400 at the 2/9 meeting per staff request by a council vote)
3. Eliminate cleaning service for city hall  $4,000 (Did not occur)
4. Eliminate 2009 park development $20,000 (Mostly eliminated, they did add a volleyball net at Northridge)
5. Eliminate token wage paid to commissioners $3,360 (They planned on eliminating the commissioners pay while our Mayor proceeded to bill about 11-12 special meetings a month plus a council meeting)

General Fund Reductions
6. Travel  $1,000 (Through June, this has increased dollar to dollar to last year)

Public Works Reductions
7. Street repair and maintenance  $5,000 (City hall cleaning service was kept instead of repairing some of our streets, the city purchased equipment for street repair last year)

City Council Reductions
8. Special meetings – limit to 2 each month per member  $6,500 (The mayor has been billing about 11-12 special meetings a month)

From the minutes: "Staff will follow the proposed reductions without council action at this time.  Swanson recommended that the city council review this item again after the State Legislature makes a decision regarding budget cuts.  Permanent reductions will require budget amendments and council authorization."

Did the staff/mayor not keep most of the proposed reductions that affected them the most?  Please attend the Truth In Taxation hearing 7 PM Monday, December 14th at the Community Center.  The community center is where voting took place last year and is next to the Fire Station.

Missing Data
I also noticed that I was missing a pay change from around 2003-05.  I made a new request to review all data on and all data that documents this.  I told the city the missing pay change data would have presumably been from 2003 as I had previously reviewed all pay change data from 2004-05.  The city responded that I hadn't requested the annual review for 2004.  This annual review would be pay change data, the city had included the annual review for 2005 when I had requested the pay change data for the 4 years above; I had even stated in that request that "Examples of said data: packets, minutes, reviews, etc.".  Why didn't the city provide the data the first time it was requested?

When the city responded to this new data request, so far they have only provided the minutes granting approval of the annual review.  Mayor Kauffman said earlier this year that the city staff are dedicated, that he hoped this would be a fresh start for Montrose, and that certain members of the community [had] personal agendas [that] are seemingly more important to them than the health of our community.  I wonder what he was referring to?  The Mayor also said one of the reasons he ran for Mayor was to help save someone's job and in response to questions at times has responded that what they are doing is legal, however, would it always be ethical?