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The people come through, offering Tarpon Springs officials a wealth of ideas to raise money, curtail costs and preserve a budget surplus.
By CANDACE RONDEAUX, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times, published February 28, 2003
TARPON SPRINGS -- Against the backdrop of a national economic downturn, with the cost of insurance and fuel going up, city officials have brainstormed for months about ways to keep the city's budget balanced.
They've talked about it at commission meetings.
They've talked about it one on one.
Wednesday night, they turned to residents for their ideas.
About 25 city officials and residents met at the Craig Park Heritage Center to discuss the city's financial outlook and budget priorities.
The two-hour meeting was the third and final in a series arranged as part of a $50,000 study the city commissioned from the University of South Florida.
The study also includes a telephone survey of about 600 city residents who will answer questions about their quality of life, neighborhood conditions and other concerns.
Residents proffered ideas on ways to raise cash, suggesting everything from raising fees at the city golf course to using volunteer auxiliary police for festivals and parades to creating a nonprofit foundation for the city's cultural arts programs.
Overall, the city's $35-million budget is still in good shape, City Manager Ellen Posivach said.
About $14.3-million of that is used to pay for services such as police, fire protection, recreation, cultural programs, the library, some street work, environmental programs, economic development and general governmental services.
But Posivach and others asked residents for their thoughts on ways to raise more money and cut city spending to head off future fiscal crunches.
"We're in good economic condition right now, but the idea is to be thinking ahead, because you never know how much worse the economy can get," Posivach said.
Posivach and other officials pointed to rising insurance costs for city employees, higher property insurance rates and skyrocketing fuel prices as possible factors that could take a bite out of the city's current surplus of about $4.2-million.
The city was forced to dip into a roughly $5-million surplus last year to balance the budget and accommodate salary increases, spending about $662,000 of the extra funds for the 2002 fiscal year.
Spending on basics such as fuel, electricity and employee insurance and benefits rose by as much as $1.7-million last year, Posivach said.
Officials in cities countywide are seeking creative ways to cut those costs, some suggesting Pinellas County's 24 cities could band together to lobby for lower rates on group insurance for municipal employees.
As part of its own cost-cutting measures, the city has frozen 13 city staff positions, freeing up more than $968,000 in salary and benefits for the city's general fund. But future spending cuts to cultural or other city programs may be necessary, officials said.
"There are cities that are giving up their charters because they have to file for bankruptcy," said Mayor Frank DiDonato, who attended public forums on the city's budget held earlier this month. "We don't want to be one of those."
-- Candace Rondeaux can be reached at (727) 445-4182 or rondeaux@sptimes.com.