NOTN- Juneau’s city manager is urging residents to stay engaged and, not to panic as the Assembly prepares to confront a multimillion-dollar budget shortfall that could reshape what services the city provides.
“I think the message I want for the public is definitely be engaged, because, you know, this is where some of the real conversations start to happen, but not the panic. Because the silver lining to this exercise is we, everyone from staff to the assembly, and hopefully the public is learning a lot more about what our city does and the valuable service we provide and who we provide them for. And we should be doing that level of deep dive in our budget process.” Katie Koester said.
Koester said the Assembly’s Finance Committee will meet today to review $2 million to $4 million in potential service reductions, part of a broader effort to address an estimated $12 million budget gap over the next two years.
“The estimated gap we have is $12 million but we don’t really know that, so the assembly is trying to take a measured approach, over two years. They know that there’s going to be some cuts that impact services, so individually, they came up with $2 -4 million in service productions, and they’re looking at that collated a list (this) evening, so it will be the first time some people see, their favorite services, or their favorite things on a list.” Koester said.
The Juneau Independent has published a story detailing some of those potential cuts which can be read here.
The list of possible cuts will be presented publicly tonight.
She also cautioned against alarm, saying the process has forced the city, the Assembly and hopefully the public to take a deeper look at what the city does, who it serves and what those services are worth.
Koester said the priority is to avoid ‘nickel-and-diming’ every program and ending up with a city that does many things poorly.
“I think what we can not afford to do, and I think the assembly sees this, is to do a lot of things really poorly, right? The assembly is really trying to take a look at what things should we be doing? What things should we not be doing? and making sure that the services that we do provide, we continue to provide well.” She said.
Alongside potential cuts, the Assembly will also examine foregone revenue, areas where the city may not be collecting as much as it could under current policy.
That includes a fresh look at some sales tax exemptions and other practices that may be limiting the city’s ability to raise money without new tax hikes.
“I certainly think the future is bright, with a lot of development, with the coming of the Coast Guard and all of those things, right? We have more people. We have more economic activity that provides more tax revenue for services, more dollars circulating in our economy.” She said, “Those are all good things, because another thing that the assembly is looking at on (today) is foregone revenue. They’re taking a fresh look at just how we do things and why we do things.”
Still, the immediate focus will be on the detailed, sometimes uncomfortable budget work now beginning in public.
The Assembly is expected to continue its budget work in the coming weeks, with more public discussion as members narrow down which services to preserve and where to look for new or previously overlooked revenue before the budget is due in June.
