By Paul Tuthill
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Springfield, MA – The mayor of Springfield Massachusetts is recommending a new budget he says will force lay offs of some municipal workers and cutbacks in some city services. City councilors say the massive budget document they were presented Monday night is still short on specifics. WAMC"s Pioneer Valley Bureau Chief Paul Tuthill reports..
The 544 million dollar budget proposed by Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno represents a two percent increase from the current fiscal year budget. It eliminates 82 jobs in city government, which the mayor says will necessitate 34 lay offs. More than 300 non union city employees will have their pay frozen and will have to take a dozen unpaid furlough days. Hours of operation at the city's library branches will be reduced, but all will remain open.
Mayor Sarno says there are bright spots in the budget. There will be no layoffs of uniformed police officers and firefighters. The budget funds new recruits from recent training academies in both the police and fire departments. After school and summer youth programs will continue , swimming pools and spray parks will open on schedule.
In a bid to avoid layoffs, the Sarno administration asked municipal unions for a wage freeze and furloughs, but the city's labor relations director William Mahoney says none of the city's 13 unions would agree to concessions.
City officials say the lay offs will be spread across multiple departments.But other than the cut back in library branch hours, the mayor, at a press conference, was unwilling to be more specific when asked how city services would be impacted.
City Councilor Michael Fenton, who chairs the council's finance committee, questioned the administrations finance team Monday night about how the budget cuts would be distributed, and was not satisfied with the answers
Fenton said he's concerned about the use of 10 million dollars from the citys reserves to balance the budget, and also the use what he said were one time revenues to pay for recurring expenses.
The proposed budget counts on revenue from a 75 dollar annual household trash collection fee, which the city council has already endorsed. It also includes an increase in the city's hotel room tax, which the council has not approved. City officials say the budget's impact on property taxes should be neutral.
City councilor Timothy Rooke says higher taxes are not the answer to the citys financial woes
By law the city council can only make cuts to the budget proposed by the mayor. The city's chief administration and finance officer Lee Erdmann notes last year, the council cut less than 500 thousand dollars from the proposed spending plan
City council president Jose Tosado, who is also an announced candidate for mayor, said he plans to schedule at least three public hearings on the budget. The council must approve a budget by July first, the start of the new fiscal year