Budget planning brings up questions

Alexis Barker
NLJ News Editor
 
The amount budgeted to service providers makes up less than 1% of Newcastle’s total budget, according to Councilman Don Steveson. Still, the City Council has asked those providers to defend their budget requests before the upcoming budget planning for fiscal year 2021. 
On Jan. 27, the city’s committee of the whole met to discuss funding for the various service providers after Mayor Deb Piana asked the council to consider cuts to the service providers’ share of the budget during last year’s budget process. 
According to City Clerk-Treasurer Greg James, there are 10 service providers who receive a total of $240,750 in city funds. James said that most of these providers are currently listed as health and welfare in the budget and that Piana directed him to relocate all other service providers to that section of the budget. 
“The intent of this meeting is for you to review and decide ahead of preparing the budget if you wish to make cuts to these providers, like were previously discussed last year,” James said. 
During a previous discussion, James said, a 10% across-the-board cut was suggested. 
“The difficulty, like I alluded to some months ago, is there are some political considerations to that, whether anyone cares to admit it or not,” James said. “There are political considerations to funding these.”
The service providers and their boards and staff help carry the 1% optional tax vote and, in turn, roughly 33% of that money goes back to those organizations, he said. 
“The rest of that money simply goes into the general fund for general operations.” Without that money, James said, the city would have to make significant cuts to the general fund operations, which includes cemetery, parks, the police department, fire department and operations and city hall
“To lose between $500,000 and $600,000 out of the general fund would be a significant cut,” he said. “The best way to balance that would be significant cuts to the departments that are funded by the general fund or a reduction in personnel. I don’t mean to be the doomsayer, but that would probably mean zero funding to service organizations.” 
According to Piana, the importance of discussing the 1% optional tax is the fact that when it was up to the vote in the last election, it barely passed. James added that the number of voters in favor of the tax has been dropping. 
“I think that is due to a lack of education. We dropped the ball on promoting the need for the tax and telling these organizations to support and share the need to their employees and users,” Piana said. 
Despite the 1% sales tax, James said, a 10% cut would hurt some service providers more than others and really doesn’t give the city much additional funding.
“It is not saving us $100,000. It is saving us $27,000,” he said. 
Piana, bringing up what she called the elephant in the room, asked Councilman Roger Hespe, who owns Newcastle Ambulance Service, about the $100,000 that service receives from the city annually. 
Hespe said that if the city were to take away that money it would have a direct impact on his business and the services it provides. He said that even a 10% cut would mean a loss of the service. 
“Each service deserves what they can get. … Everyone needs every nickel they can get,” Hespe said. 
The council determined that all service providers should have their requests for fiscal 2021 submitted by March 2 so that the council can review them before meeting with each of the providers on March 30. Council members asked that the  providers include more information, including how they fund themselves beyond what the city provides.