It looks like Sitka’s Parks and Recreation manager will keep her job. A half-time employee at the customer service counter in City Hall can also tear up a pink slip.
The Sitka Assembly last night (Tue 5-22-12) worked through next year’s municipal budget and made some tough cuts, but existing personnel were not among them.
Proposed funding cuts to the library, the museum, and the Sitka Convention and Visitor’s Bureau were also restored.
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City Parks & Rec manager Lynne Brandon has fans, and they turned to lobby the assembly to continue to fund the position.
Assembly members maintained that the decision whether or not to fund the job was not at all personal. Members of the public who testified, however, thought Brandon’s loss would cost Sitka more than the assembly realized.
–I’m Hans vonRekowski, chairman of the Parks and Recreation Committee. I’ve come before you to support this position. Lynne has brought in over $3-million in grants for the program….
–I’m John Stein, 101 Cedar Beach Road. I support adding back in the manager’s position for Parks & Rec. I just think it’s a specialized area, and we’ve done really well with that position in place….
–Mary Stevenson. I too would agree to have consideration of having Lynne back on the job. When you take a person who’s as qualified as she, who’s put in a lot of hours and knows a lot of things that are in the pipeline to be done, and then to totally yank her out July 1st in the new fiscal, you’re putting strain on the other employees within that department who are now working time-and-a-half just to catch up. So are you really saving? She brings the intelligence, the expertise, and it’s a big void should she be gone July 1st.
This was about the full extent of public testimony over the course of three hours of deliberation on the budget. The assembly convened in a special meeting before its regular meeting, but spent much of that time trying to figure out how to tackle the list of 28 proposed cuts – whether to formally vote on each item, or to try to reach consensus informally. They eventually settled on the latter, but some issues – like whether to retain a department head – seemed too weighty to just skip through.
Assembly member Mike Reif.
“And I think the worst part of our job when we look at this decrement list is there’s real people attached to each of these positions. And I would gladly let any one of you have my position up here, because it’s an extremely difficult position to be in, because I have to look at you in the face if I decide to vote against funding this.”
Thor Christianson suggested moving the decision about the Parks & Rec manager to the bottom of the list, and the rest of the assembly agreed. But by that time the one-hour special meeting was over, with no formal action, and it would take another two hours of regular assembly business to get back to the budget.
In this second round, things moved faster. The assembly had over $600,000 in additional funding from the federal and state government to work with. Taking the list of the administrator’s cuts – or “decrements”- the assembly restored funding for summer groundskeepers, at $56,000. They put back a $264,000 cost-of-living adjustment for all city staff. They returned over $43,000 to the Sitka Convention and Visitor’s Bureau.
Thor Christianson advocated for the SCVB.
“If there’s anything that’s going to increase our tax revenue, that’s it. I’d like to see us get much more aggressive toward all types of visitors, not just cruise ships. But everybody from eco-tourism to charter boats.”
The assembly also restored $20,000 cut from the Sitka Historical Museum. Mayor Cheryl Westover said the Historical Society and the Visitor’s Bureau worked together as an economic engine and “their own little enterprise group.” She didn’t think it wise to short-sell the Museum, after the city had just won a $4.5-million capital appropriation to expand it.
The assembly also put back $26,000 cut from the library. Christianson said Kettleson was probably the single-most popular thing in the city. Assembly member Mim McConnell, who also heads up the nonprofit Easter Group, saw the library in a different light.
“You know, we don’t have a homeless shelter in town. The library is kind of our surrogate homeless shelter. It’s a safe place for people to hang out, so the longer hours we can have there, the better.”
Phyllis Hackett observed that it wasn’t only the homeless who sought shelter in the library. Cruise visitors were so frequent she thought the city should use state head-tax monies to support the facility. Hackett also argued for restoring $32,000 cut from the city’s annual appropriation to non-profits.
Some of the items the assembly did not restore were $500,000 for a new computer network in city hall, $240,000 for two vacant police positions, and $17,000 for street repairs.
Eventually, the assembly got back to the two proposed layoffs: the Parks & Rec manager, and a half-time customer service representative in the Finance Department.
Finance director Jay Sweeney said the loss of the employee – who was just hired earlier this spring – would be bearable, but it would mean reducing hours at the city’s customer service counter to noon to 3 PM weekdays.
The assembly thought that was poor service, and restored $25,000 for the position.
Parks & Rec manager Lynne Brandon spoke on her own behalf, when asked if she planned to push for new park infrastructure, or to maintain what Sitka already has. Brandon said she had collaborated with Trailworks to spend $800,000 in state transportation funding to continue upgrades to the Cross Trail. She said the department was not “in growth mode.”
“My main mission over the next year is to try to get money to rehabilitate our playgrounds, which are very substandard. Once again another safety issue for the City and Borough. We’re trying to create a system of sustainable and safe park areas.”
The assembly put funding for Brandon’s job back on the list – at a total cost of $94,000.
In order to meet budget deadlines, the assembly will hold a special meeting next Tuesday (5-29-12) to hear this amended budget on first reading, and to consider two proposed sales tax ordinances that have been repeatedly postponed – until now: the end of the senior sales tax exemption, and an increase in the $1,000 sales tax cap.
