Rohnert Park council divided over budget
Published: Tuesday, January 26, 2010 at 3:00 a.m.
Last Modified: Tuesday, January 26, 2010 at 9:02 p.m.
A bitterly divided Rohnert Park City Council fought amongst itself Tuesday even as it confronted a multimillion dollar budget hole that one councilwoman called an “abyss.”
After a day in which two councilmembers left a budget workshop in protest, the council voted 3-2 to adopt an amended $26.5 million city budget that projects a $4.4 million deficit, unless additional spending cuts are made.
The council was urged by its city manager to put a half-cent sales tax on the ballot to raise $2.5 to $3 million a year.
“We have to stop the bleeding in our general fund,” interim City Manager Dan Schwarz said at an afternoon study session.
Absent new revenue and more cuts — largely to public safety services, he recommended — the city’s deficit would rapidly grow to $5.6 million, Schwarz said. The city has spent down its $9 million reserves by half and is on track to run out of money by March 2011.
The state this year will take $4.1 million in property taxes from the city, money which funds redevelopment capital projects and housing, finance director Sandy Lipitz told the council. Another key source of funding, sales tax revenue, is projected to be $850,000 less than expected, she said.
Vice Mayor Gina Belforte said the city was on the edge of a financial “abyss,” and predicted a “very hard time” of 18 months to two years.
“Getting us financially sound will back us up from that precipice,” she said.
Councilmembers Amie Breeze and Joe Callinan walked out of the workshop in protest. They said the 1 p.m. meeting at the Spreckels Performing Arts Center was held at a time and place that limited the public’s ability to attend the proceeding.
“In my eyes this is not a legal meeting,” Callinan said.
He and Breeze argued the meeting should have been televised and held at a time when more members of the public could attend.
During a testy exchange, Mayor Pam Stafford said the meeting was properly advertised. While Breeze was mayor last year, she noted, several similar, non-televised meetings to discuss budget issues were also held at the Spreckels Center.
“This is the poorest example of leadership I have ever seen,” Belforte said, moments before Breeze and Callinan left.
The departure of Breeze and Callinan — who stalked from the stage as Stafford opened the meeting to public comment — delineated a clear rift on the council that was strikingly personal in tone.
It’s a rift that will likely color the council discussions yet to come over the budget deficit, with both Breeze and Callinan already on record as opposing the cuts proposed by city staff. The pair voted against adopting the amended budget at the evening council meeting.
The dissenting pair protested cuts that Schwarz has suggested, including laying off six officers in the public safety department, which combines police and fire services.
“This is not the right thing to do and I am not in favor of it,” Breeze said before leaving, garnering applause from the audience of about 60 people, many of them public safety officers.
Schwarz said the layoffs would save the city $810,000 a year. An additional layoff in the department’s command staff would save as much as $217,000, he said. He has proposed two other layoffs in other departments, and freezing three currently vacant positions in public works and administrative services.
The council has yet to take up the discussion of that proposal and did not vote on it Tuesday night.
“I’m saying do it as soon as possible,” Schwarz said during a break in the meeting.
The city’s director of public safety, Brian Masterson, said the proposed cuts would likely slow firefighter response time, reduce the number of police patrol officers and make the police more “reactive” as opposed to getting out ahead of policing and quality of life issues.
Asked whether the cuts would make the city less safe, Masterson said: “I wouldn’t say that because I think it gets into hyperbole. But with less officers on the street the citizens become more likely to become victimized by crime.”
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