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Friday, 19 June 2009 |
By MIKE BURKHOLDER
Managing Editor
ST. MARYS — As income tax collection rates reach 10-year lows, a city official say the city is examining all options available to trim expenses while maintaining services.
“The last time we collected this amount was in 1999,” Safety-Service Director Tom Hitchcock said. “In 1999, we collected $1,450,864 and it kept going up from there.”
Through May 31, the city collected $1.515 million in income taxes. The figure is approximately $680,000 less than what was collected in 2008 and approximately $330,000 less than the 2007 total.
“It’s impacted a little bit,” Hitchcock said. “But going into this year, we cut a lot out of our budget. We held off on some projects that are paid from the income tax. We’ve even postponed some projects we had this year.”
On Monday, Hitchcock rolled out a tentative budget for 2010 — a document that is approximately $2.8 million less than this year’s spending measure. Some of the areas sliced for next year include vehicle purchases and raises for employees who are not already under current contracts that stipulate raises.
“We are watching costs where we can,” Hitchcock said. “We didn’t hire as many summer kids this year — we reduced it by 15.”
Hitchcock said the smaller collection rates have prompted the city to examine more efficient ways of doing business. That process, he said, has resulted in some changes.
“I give credit to our department heads, they’ve stepped up and found some better ways to do things,” Hitchcock said. “We’ve changed the way we mow. We have three different departments that mow now. That saves on travel costs.”
In addition to facing dwindling revenue streams, Hitchcock said keeping employee morale high is difficult.
“There’s a lot of people scared for their jobs, not just in the city,” Hitchcock said. “Layoffs, at this point, aren’t an option. Our carryover has helped us weather the storm. We also don’t have a lot of excess personnel.” |
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Last Updated ( Wednesday, 15 July 2009 )
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