You know, when we pass the budget, we fight quite a bit over what does and does not get funded. We scrimp and save and cut here and there and add here and there and when we’re all done, we’re under the impression that what we did actually matters. I find out, more and more every day, how things we do get ignored and pushed off by staff and/or the Mayor’s office. Here’s just a few examples from last year’s budget:
We put $50,000 in the budget for an Economic Development Plan. It’ll be September and we’ll finally be approving the use of those funds. We were promised that this would happen in the 2006 budget with private funds, but that never happened. What the heck took so long? We decided in November and it took 8 months to choose someone to do the work. They won’t finish their work until Feb 2008.
We also put $100,000 in the budget for a Downtown Neighborhood Plan as well. And I don’t see anything happening.
What happened to this:
June 1 came and went and the Mayor still hasn’t appointed the committee. I think that committee morphed into this in the budget process, but still, the committee isn’t yet appointed and their report is due Oct. 15th.
Who is the new neighborhood planner we authorized and what have they been doing? There’s a long list of neighborhood plans that are languishing.
What about the $150,000 we put in the budget for re-writing the zoning code? What has happened with that? We had also put $250,000 in the 2006 budget and nothing happened.
We also put money in the budget for marketing of the BioAg Gateway and they’re first thinking about putting out an RFP for that.
Are we going to see the results of the $50,000 we gave to the police department for their police staffing study?
I wonder how many other projects staff haven’t had time to get to that I haven’t noticed. This year, when we’re fighting over which non-profit to cut, I suggest we look at the unspent money in some of these departments and reconsider where we put our funds. I can guarantee you that with one notable exception, those pennies for the non-profits are not going unspent.
I’d even go a little further, this year, when we do our budgeting, I think we need to ask for workplans. We shouldn’t approve money for projects that aren’t going to get done, or we should spread their funding out over two years if that is what is going to happen. Or, we should give the departments the resources they need if we’re serious about getting this work done. We really need some truth in budgeting and some better information for the public and the council members who have vote on this stuff.
And finally, a bit of a side note, every single one of those projects listed above is under the supervision of one guy, with one exception in the police department. This is the same guy who runs the CDA and some people think can negotiate with himself to redevelop a 9 acre parcel of land when he has no development experience. If you ask me, I think we have mis-management issues that are not limited to the Water Utility. If he can’t complete the projects we have already given him, how can he or the Mayor expect us to vote to give him even more responsibility?
