From Democratic mayoral candidate John Gomes:
Gomes Statement on Budget for the City Budget 2011-2012
One of the dirtier tricks played so far by the Finch Administration on the Bridgeport taxpayers comes with the new City budget which Finch claims has no tax increases.
Hold onto your hats … the budget figures are no more than a handful of spaghetti thrown against the wall to see what sticks.
Accordingly, like lemmings to the sea, 16 Council members voted yes, 2 voted no, and two were not even there to vote.
This is not genuine budget; it is a mixture of deception, concealment and outright lies.
There is the matter of putting positions in the budget when there are no people for the position. 22 positions are ghost positions, but the money is not “ghost money.” It is very real taxpayer money that will be used to pay for political appointments, office perks for the Finch administration and payments for trips and other indulgences. There is no admission that this budget is already $30 million short because of pension contributions that have been deferred. And yet another deferral is requested this year.
Additionally, the increased salaries for the Mayor’s staff and appointees remained in place while other rank and file city employees in the City had to accept layoffs, furloughs, higher health insurance deductibles and co-payments.
There has been no honesty or accuracy with numbers for at least twenty years that the budget has been manipulated by Tom Sherwood, Budget Director.
We are looking at financial disaster with the continuance of this budget process.
It is time for the ineffective City Council members to go, it is time for Tom Sherwood to go and it is more than time for Bill Finch to go.
Gomes makes good points but he needs to lay off the analogies.
LFG,
How do you communicate this information to your neighbors in the City so they care? If you don’t like LEMMINGS INTO THE SEA, or SPAGHETTI THROWN ON THE WALL, or GHOST POSITIONS and GHOST MONEY, perhaps you have some better descriptive language? Language that grabs notice; language your neighbor or the woman on the street can immediately grasp; words that will stick in memory until election day and show the way for change to be voted in by an electorate no longer willing to put up with “dirty tricks.”
LFG, you are a smart guy, show us the way to use language that grabs the reader and the listener!
John Gomes, congratulations, you are right on with your observations on this year’s budget. As a member of BOB I have seen you at several of the B & A Meetings so your impressions are fair and reasonable in terms of what you saw of the few who heard City presentations, and they are accurate in assessing the actual decisions of most members of the Council.
I am still struggling with how best to present the “dirty tricks” you mention to the public, though I am not running for office, but I am happy that serious candidates are picking up on the deceptions and half-truths of Finch and Company.
At the moment the City Council can be termed “incompetent” for missing the Other Post Employment Benefit issue to the tune of $20 Million annually over the past three years; “conflicted” for ignoring real opportunities to cut positions in the budget and passing along so many funded positions with no real commitment to fill; and “unaware” by missing the deception of Finch, Feeney, et al. regarding Pension A contributions, that will bring Judgement Day closer and faster. That is the day when Plan A runs out of money entirely and the General Fund will be responsible for Bond Payment of $30,269,267 per year through 2029 as well as projected income to retirees of $32 Million for at least the next 10 years (and probably more when this year’s public safety contracts increase benefits for the retirees in Plan A).
I = Incompetent and not really interested in change
C= Conflicted but again–no interest in public good
U = Unaware and not listening to professional advice
It looks like their ICU is going to put the City in the ICU well before 2020. No serious negotiations to change the playing field by Finch and associates! How do we know that? Well, we know Bill Finch never has let an opportunity pass to claim credit, full credit, for anything that looks interesting to him. He has not claimed, nor has he shown how our labor negotiators have pulled the City back from the edge with City employees.
Perhaps one or more of the candidates will begin to project the real future cost of the cans that are kicked down the road. In those cans are the current costs that were not paid previously + the additional cost of interest or inflation where applicable. (If you are not sick of hearing it already, remember the Pension Obligation Bond produced $350 Million in 2000 for Pension Plan A. Over 30 years the City taxpayers will repay $906 Million to those bondholders. Does a 7.4% return look good to you today relative to what your bank is paying on a six-month savings account? Different instruments but why is it costing the City so much? That’s another secret, to be unwrapped another day …
*** No static needed on an election year “three-card monte” budget, just go with the flow, no? *** Place your bets! ***