After scrutinizing the city’s proposed budget 2001-02 for weeks, Evanston City Council will consider a final question Monday: Who pays?

The city manager’s proposed budget is 9.4 percent larger than last year’s. In a city where property taxes have increased for the past two fiscal years, the council is seeking an alternative means of generating revenue.

“You either have to cut out a service or bite your tongue and raise taxes,” City Manager Roger Crum said Thursday, speaking to journalism students at Northwestern.

At Monday’s meeting the council will debate the latest alternative: a 1 percent tax on food and beverages.

The tax would be added to the sales tax customers already pay at Evanston restaurants and bars. It also would apply to fast-food restaurants and food sales at events such as NU football games.

Crum estimated that the restaurant tax would garner the city $600,000 a year in revenues.

Those revenues would offset a portion of any possible property tax hike but would not replace it, meaning property taxes likely would still increase.

According to Crum’s estimate, the average homeowner in Evanston would pay $140 more in property taxes if the city doesn’t tax restaurant sales.

“The reality is we don’t have many choices,” he said. “People like good services but don’t want to pay the taxes.”

The restaurant tax proposal didn’t go over well with Gail Huttenlocher, general manager of the Davis Street Fish Market, 501 Davis St.

She said that although most customers might not even notice the tax, it could potentially keep away customers from outside Evanston.

“It’s only one percent, so most people will not notice,” she said. “But there will be some who will.”

Huttenlocher said that because restaurant customers already pay high sales taxes