Bellingham City Council slashes 2009 budget

SAM TAYLOR - THE BELLINGHAM HERALD

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BELLINGHAM - City Council members made official about $2.5 million in budget cuts during their Monday, March 23 meeting.

Council members voted 6-1, with Barbara Ryan opposed, to make the budget reductions official. Ryan questioned why the administration wanted to change the initial revenue projections of the budget, rather than issuing an amendment to the budget.

City finance staff told Ryan that she and the public would still see the originally-adopted 2009 budget online as well as the revised figures. Still, that didn't quell Ryan's concerns, who said she questioned it from her own personal accounting standpoint. Ryan co-owns Waycross Investment Management Company with her husband, Michael Ryan. Though she has reduced her direct responsibilities with the company during her 12 years on the council, she managed portfolio accounting and marketing for the company in the past.

City Budget Manager Brian Henshaw said they were not doing a budget amendment, but rather doing a full reduction in revenues and doing a changed budget, because of how large the change in the budget is compared to the normal amendments the City Council approves.

Mayor Dan Pike's administration had already frozen the 2.75 percent in government spending due to continually falling revenues. The council officially removed the budget authority for the money to reduce the general fund budget baseline by about $2 million, from $72 million to $70 million. No layoffs are happening, though nine positions will be slashed through attrition, officials have said.

The 2010 budget will be written with the new base in play. City Finance Director John Carter said the lower base will help meet the City Council's goal of a 12 percent reserve, given lower projected revenues.

Meanwhile, city officials are looking at how to completely change how the local government spends money. They are looking at things like personnel and benefits - two-thirds of the city's costs, Chief Administrative Officer David Webster has said - and how to better share resources though parts of some city departments are not at City Hall.

Reach Sam Taylor at sam.taylor@bellinghamherald.com or call 715-2263. Read his Politics Blog at TheBellinghamHerald.com/blogs.