As posts on this blog will show over and over, I have been concerned with the amount of debt that we are carrying. The tax payment that we send to the city each year is used to pay debt at a higher percentage than any city around us (2008 figures). Even with a high tax rate, we have less left for running the city, for funding the Operations and Maintenance budget. Currently, forty-five percent of your tax payment is set aside for making debt payments.
 

80% of our tax dollars go toward debt service and public safety

 
Balancing the budget is an annual challenge but the last two years have been harder than most. A shortfall in revenues last year resulted in service cuts that were already thin in many respects, taken from that 20% that doesn't go to debt service and public safety. Jobs positions were left open or simply removed from the books. This year was worse, mostly because of property value declines. As the chart above shows, there is not a lot of room to trim the budget and, consequently, a pay reduction for all employees was necessary. As a number of employees mentioned during the budget period this year, they see the amount of debt squeezing their side of the pie.
 

Approximately two-thirds of the tax dollar that goes to the General Fund is used for public safety, 38% for everything else

 
In 2004, citizens approved $200,000,000 projects for:

• Streets (56.7%),
• Drainage/Flooding (14%),
• Parks (10.8%),
• Libraries (4.7%),
• Public Safety (6.5%),
• Municipal Facilities (5.6%), and
• Economic Development (1.7%).

Good or bad, many of those projects have been delayed so the whole amount has not been borrowed and spent. The cost of construction had been rising so delaying the projects meant higher costs later. Now construction costs are down dramatically, generally 20% or so on large projects yet we're not taking advantage of the lower prices. Frankly, we can't afford to without pushing that 45% even higher.
 
As I mentioned earlier: "We also have to change many of the ways we do business. We have to focus on the things that will grow the city. We can't waste resources for non-essential programs or for things that can be postponed. We have to market the city. Employees and Council members must ask ourselves at each decision point: will this grow the city?"