City of Evanston Blog
FY 2012 Budget Preparation Begins Early
The City Council will be meeting tomorrow night to begin discussion on the preparation of the FY 2012 budget. Never before in my 22 years of local government service have I been involved in starting the discussion of the preparation of the next year's budget nine months before its start. I bring the issue to the City Council so far in advance because I believe the decisions made for FY 2012 will set a course for the City of Evanston for the next several years.
This City Council has already made reductions of nearly $13 million from the adopted FY 2008/09 budget. These cuts have been difficult, but I do not believe have had a substantial impact on the services we provide residents or their quality of life. Looking to FY 2012 and 2013, I believe the City will continue to have deficits in the $1.5 to $2 million range just to continue the status quo. I believe there are no further service reductions that can be made that will not significantly impact the services we provide and the quality of life of our residents. Evanston is a special place and maintaining a high level of quality of life services is a cornerstone of this City. I believe we must look realistically at what are the most important services we provide and make sure that these services are provided at the most exceptional level possible. For those services and programs we can not deliver at that level, I believe it is appropriate to look to others to provide the service.
The City has already raised property taxes for pension costs the last several years with no additional portion of the property tax going to general fund operations. I believe the City does not have the luxury to further increase the property tax (or any other taxes) without increasing flight of residents and businesses from Evanston and making taxes an even more significant barrier to residents and businesses locating here. Keeping and enhancing the current mix of residents and mix of businesses is critical to the future of Evanston.
This financial situation is against a backdrop of the need to reinvest in and reinvigorate the most important services we provide rather than see status quo or deterioration of them. In addition, I believe the City needs to increase its investments in critical quality of life infrastructure (streets, parks, public facilities) without significantly adding to general obligation debt that we already are challenged to pay off. Part of a solution in funding capital is to shift some annual operating funds to capital projects as a permanent change in City spending.
On Tuesday, I will be recommending to the City Council that we begin a complete review of all city services. This review will include an evaluation of each service, the costs and revenues associated with them, and how the service helps implement the goals of the City's strategic plan and the City Council's goals. This evaluation would ultimately assign a numeric score to each service to help the City Council identify a prioritization for every service performed by the City.
In addition, I will be recommending that we review programs and services that regardless of their priority could be delivered in a more cost effective manner. This review will include specific opportunities for contracting in, contracting out or partnerships with non profits or other government agencies. I also want us to think more about innovation of how we provide services and develop ideas that will support better ways to deliver them.
Finally, I will be recommending that staff review best practices of ten like communities in Illinois and throughout the United States to help better inform our discussions of program delivery.
The proposed timeline for this process would include a community discussion about the process during April to get feedback and suggestions; a special City Council meeting on May 18, 2011 to review work done on the Evanston program and other community best practice reviews and receive direction from the City Council as appropriate; review of the completed program reviews at the City Council August meeting as well as to set financial targets for budget changes for FY 2012; and a series of community budget workshops in September to begin to finalize the package of budget changes to inform the proposed FY 2012 budget to be submitted to the City Council in early October.
No decisions have been made about specific programs or facilities to close or reduce. I think there are many opportunities to explore and I hope that the City Council and the community are ready to explore them.
More to follow in the coming weeks.
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