Three aldermen presented an alternative budget proposal at Monday night’s budget workshop with only one week to go before a final budget is scheduled to be adopted.
The proposal drafted by Alds. Arthur Newman (1st), Melissa Wynne (3rd) and Gene Feldman (9th) would eliminate nearly all City Manager Roger Crum’s proposed budget cuts and replaces them with new revenue sources and cuts in an effort to solve the city’s almost $4 million budget deficit. The revenue increases do not include a possible head tax proposed by Ald. Ann Rainey (8th), which the council rejected.
In order to balance the budget with the reduction of cuts to programs such as the branches of the Evanston Public Library, funding for the Evanston Community Media Center and the arts program, the aldermen proposed new fees and taxes. The plan includes $870,000 in new fees for services such as building permits and recycling costs and more than $400,000 in increased property taxes.
The property tax increase would cause a 7.24 percent increase in the city’s portion of the property tax, which translates to an increase of about $108 per year for the owner of a $300,000 house. Crum proposed a 5.69 percent increase that would have cost $85 per year.
The largest new proposed cut is a $325,000 reduction in non-union employee raises. Instead of 4 percent raises next year, employees would receive 2 percent raises. In addition, the city would decrease sick pay and begin increasing employees’ contribution to medical insurance premiums.
Newman said the council would like to increase the wages, but unforeseen problems including the events of Sept. 11 caused a strain on the city.
“You can’t pay 4 percent raises when the money’s not coming in,” Newman said. “In an emergency situation, I think the people of this city would want to save jobs rather than eliminate more.”
This cut met some opposition by targeting only non-union employees. Ald. Edmund Moran (6th) said the council would be departing from a long-term precedent of treating these employees the same as union employees, a trend Crum confirmed. Moran said the proposal would damage the city staff by creating a “caste” system.
“What we are asking our employees to do is for half our employees to help us solve this problem and were going to put it on their backs,” he said.
In order to come up with the difference, Moran asked Crum to prepare for next Monday a report on the budget effect of 11 other programs Crum introduced as possible cuts. These include reductions in city staff, reduction of landlord-tenant support and the elimination or charging for yard waste pickup.
Other aldermen expressed concern with the proposal’s limited reduction in expenses and the sustainability of this proposal.
“The reality of the situation is that we will not be able to solve our systemic budget problem until we take a very difficult and unpopular look at what we spend our money on,” said Ald. Stephen Engelman (7th).
In their attempt to balance the budget, aldermen chose to avoid incorporating a head tax of $5 per employee per month for employers of five or more people. The council voted 8-1 to drop the head tax this year with many aldermen stressing the need to protect businesses in order to solve the budget problem. The tax was first proposed last year for employers of more than 1,000 employees but was ultimately tabled.
Newman said a head tax would hamper Evanston’s ability to attract businesses and increase tax revenue by driving businesses to neighboring communities .
“This is not the way to go if the community wants to be vibrant,” Newman said.
But in defending the proposed tax, Rainey said the tax would help relieve the tax burden on residents.
“It is not the devastating blow to business (some aldermen) want it to be,” she said. “It would relieve the residential property owner in the long run.”
