The city’s passage of a $1.4 billion 2014 budget Tuesday – with 113 eliminated
positions, projected gains in property and sales tax, and small use of one-time
savings to bridge a shortfall – may mark the last of a series of
post-recessionary budgets with big gaps to close between revenue and expense,
Mayor Betsy Price and other Fort Worth officials said Tuesday.
The budget, as expected, restored half of a potential cut in the fire budget
and money proposed to be cut for alley mowing and street and athletic field
maintenance. Fire Chief Rudy Jackson, who had warned he would have to deactivate
fire companies on a rotating basis, told council members last
week he would be able to avoid that move to start the year.
The budget puts Fort Worth on course for stable annual budget outlooks in the
future, after several years of big initial shortfalls, Mayor Betsy Price
said.
“I’m optimistic,” Mayor Betsy Price said. “If property tax continues to
increase, if sales tax continues to increase and if departments continue to get
us savings that they committed to, we should be in good shape come next
September.”
As part of Tuesday’s budget votes, water rates for typical residential users
in Fort Worth will
rise 5 percent in fiscal 2014; the city’s cost of raw water continues to
rise at the same time demand softens. Sewer rates for the typical user will rise
4 percent, as the city tries to adjust for lower demand.
The citywide budget is up 0.6 percent. The $573 million general fund budget -
police, fire, transportation and public works, parks, code compliance, library,
planning and development, and the Municipal Court – is down from $583.8 million
last year.
The general fund budget leaves the property tax rate at 85.5 cents per $100
of assessed value, where it’s been for nearly 20 years. That amounts to
$1,282.50 for a home appraised at $150,000 for tax purposes.
The budget includes a one-month, one-time potential pay raise for general
employees in September 2014. The raise would be 5 percent on average, Jay Chapa,
the interim financial management services director, said Tuesday.
The City Council would likely consider making pay raises permanent for
general employees in the 2015 budget if that year’s outlook is stable, Chapa
said.
Vince Chasteen, president of the city’s general employee association, is
skeptical the general employees will see a raise in 2015. General employees have
received one pay raise in the last five years, while police and fire employees
generallly receive annual raises under contract.
“Everybody who works for the city has a stake in what goes
on in order to service the citizens,” Chasteen said. “For certain groups to be
treated differently, I never have felt that was the right thing to do, but it is
the way it is.”
Price said she’s optimistic city departments can find $5 million in savings
through the year to fund pay raises of 3-5 percent in 2015 for general
employees.
“That is good,” she said. “Our general fund employees haven’t had a raise in
a long time.”
The 113 eliminated positions were virtually all vacant, as city staff had
been leaving positions open after attrition heading into the 2014 budget
review.
The budget contains a limited number of potential layoffs. Of seven employees
most recently facing layoff, one was offered another job in the city and
declined, and two retired, Chapa said.
City officials said they expect the property and sales tax picture to look
stronger for 2015; those two revenue sources account for more than 70 percent of
the general fund. Citywide, sales tax revenue is projected up 4 percent in 2014,
and the property tax revenue base is projected up 2.7 percent even though the
tax rate remains the same.
The city, which is self-insured, also is moving to compress its healthcare
costs, up a projected 3 percent in 2014 from 8 percent last year.
“We’ll have some savings that weren’t there before,” Chapa said.
Much of the controversy surrounding the budget focused on cuts to public
safety staffing.
The Fire Department originally faced a $3.8 million budget cut, and Jackson
warned
then he would have to deactivate an average of four companies per day. (A
fire company is one vehicle and its crew.)
In late August, City Manager Tom Higgins and the budget staff restored
half the department’s proposed cut. Jackson said he’d have to deactivate two
companies on average per day. Average response times would have increased by one
minute at the affected stations during deactivations, Jackson said.
Council members worried, however, that fire protection would lessen, and
Jackson told council members last week he would be able to start the year with
no deactivations. The department will rotate firefighter-qualified inspectors,
arson and bomb personnel, and prevention officers into firehouses from time to
time to augment staff. The council will review the staffing situation at the end
of the first quarter.
Jim Tate, president of the Fort Worth
Professional Firefighters association, said Tuesday “I feel pretty
confident” the department can avoid deactivations. “We’re going to make a lot of
sacrifices.”
If the city’s revenues exceed the budget, there’s potential for the
restoration of full funding at mid-year, Tate said.
“We’re able to keep all the companies in service and keep our citizens safe,
and that’s the top priority,” Tate said.
The council voted unanimously on the budget votes. Council member Kelly Allen
Gray, whose husband is a Fort Worth police officer, recused herself from voting
on the general fund portion of the police budget.
The police department lost 46 unfilled positions, but Police Chief Jeff
Halstead told council members he couldn’t keep up with normal annual attrition
of 60-70 officers and didn’t need the unfilled positions in the 2014 budget.
The city is building a new public safety training center and headquarters on
the South Side, and Halstead said that will dramatically improve the city’s
capacity to train recruits.
Sgt. Steve Hall, president of the Fort Worth
Police Officers Association, said the city could fill the positions if
leaders had the will.
“We do have response time issues...And we are not going to fix those until we
address our staffing,” Hall said.
Priority 1 response times in far North Fort Worth are between eight and 11
minutes, Halstead said, slower than the four to seven minute average in the
city’s core.
Code compliance was originally slated to lose 10 positions, but after council
members and neighborhood representatives raised concerns, the staff restored six
of the code officers. Code compliance director Brandon Bennett said he’d
organize a “strike team” to augment his department’s efforts when problems
surface.
- Scott Nishimura, Fort Worth Star-Telegram
Twitter: @JScottNishimura
- Caty Hirst, Fort Worth Star-Telegram
Twitter: @CatyHirst
