Budget movements
It’s looking to be a long night here at the Assembly, with discussion of a number of budget amendments slated to consume the latter half of our evening. Despite that, I don’t expect final action tonight. Here’s my best guess:
- We’ll pass some amendments, some of which will not be supported by the administration, that will result in what I’ll call the “Assembly version” of the budget.
- Even if we finish deliberations on the amendments we won’t take final action tonight. Because of this municipal code requires another public hearing, which would likely take place on December 1, and final action therefore slated for a special meeting on December 9. Update: the public hearing is now scheduled for Monday, November 30, which will be a special meeting, and another special meeting to take final action is slated for December 8.
- In the intervening weeks we’ll try to reconcile the differences between the budget proposed by the administration (we’ll call that the “Mayor’s version”) and the Assembly version. My goal would be to achieve a hybrid version (in Assembly vernacular it’d be an “S,” or substitute, version) in time for the December 1 hearing.
For now we’re discussing fees (fines) for excessive police responses, not sure whether that’s an apt metaphor.
Regards,
Patrick
This contribution was made on Tuesday, 17. November 2009 at 20:31 and was published under the category
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Dear Assemblyman Flynn,
You are an obvious proponent to maintain, if not expand, People Mover bus routes. You have pretty much made this an issue in the latest MOA budget debate. Please answer for me a question; what is the ridership of the People Mover routes you so ardently defend? For example, what is the ridership by time of day?
I would like to make an informed decision about this issue. After all, all we paying for a service to many, or paying for a principle to a few?
Thank you,
Frank
Comment: Frank – 17. November 2009 @ 8:48 pm
Mr. Flynn,
News just came down that Mayor Sullivan vetoed a plan to pay the City’s bond debt as scheduled. Mayor Sullivan claims paying the bond debt as scheduled will come at a cost to taxpayers. A refinance will still cost taxpayers correct? I asked Mayor Sullivan this question via Twitter, but did not get an answer.
Comment: Gina Romero – 20. November 2009 @ 7:32 pm
Happy Thanksgiving, Patrick, and many thanks to you and the rest of the assembly for the hard work, thought and time you put into making Anchorage a great city.
Comment: k.robbins – 25. November 2009 @ 10:25 pm
This is Dan Coffey’s response to my request to pay the bill. He seems to think that we will save money or it will cost less to pay the bill. I think we are squelching on our obligation and putting it off on generations to come. He wants to blame putting it off on generations to come or what he is doing now on Begich. I think he should get over the blame and worry about this year and what he and the Mayor are doing. This sounds like old boy gerrymandering to me. Raise property taxes and pay the obligations. The police and firemen deserve what they got and probably more.
The plan has a net present value cost of $330,000.00. We save $40.00 per $100,000.00 in assessed valuation in 2010 and $30.00 per $100,000.00 in assessed valuation in 2011. In 2013 the cost goes up by $12.00 per $100,000.00 going down over 15 years to $1.00 per $100,000.00.
When cash is short and we want to avoid the necessity of raising real property taxes by 13%, deferring a small amount of MOA debt to save $12,000,000.00 in real property taxes this year and next, seems like a wise idea to me.
Finally, when you talk about “put our debt off on our children”, perhaps you would be well advised to place the blame for this on Mayor Begich’s actions which have been well reported and on those on the assembly who voted for the inflated city union contracts which will cost us $190,000,000.00 more over the next 6 years.
Comment: donald hennessey – 27. November 2009 @ 10:54 pm