“This year, however, is shaping up to be something unlike anything we’ve faced in a long, long time,” Starbird said.
In bridging a $9.9-million gap for this fiscal year’s budget, the City Council cut the equivalent of 5% from almost all the city’s departments. Those cuts translated into the loss of 42 city employee positions, sworn police officers, reduced library hours and other service reductions.
Any measures taken to raise revenue and cut costs now would hopefully keep a sluggish economy from ripping a similar gap into the budget for next fiscal year, city officials said.
Facing another untenable round of budget cuts in an election year drew a heated response from some on the dais after Councilman Bob Yousefian, who will be up for reelection in April, again held up his lone June protest vote on the city’s $750.3-million budget, a week after he voted to support the cuts that balanced the books.
“I said this may be coming,” Yousefian said, adding that he thought the budget gap could be as high as $12 million next year.
“The campaign hasn’t started, so ‘I told you so’ in regards to what?” Councilman Frank Quintero challenged.
Council members pointed out that Yousefian voted for the same employee union contracts and budget measures as the rest of the council, a point Yousefian denied.
The findings also drew out a recurring group of City Hall activists who criticized what they said was a high number of city employees, their union contracts and untempered spending.
But Councilman Ara Najarian, who with Quintero also faces reelection, disputed those assertions.
“It’s disingenuous to say ‘I told you so.’ No one’s clairvoyant up there,” he said.
