Layoffs that Wilmington city officials warned about have arrived. Twenty city workers will be out of work January 3, 2011, after Mayor James Baker (D) announced Wednesday his intention to implement the “first phase of an expenditure reduction plan.” Mayor Baker is basing his budget cuts on the most recent five-year revenue and expenditure projections, which paint a grim budgetary picture.
The projections “show the city getting into progressively deeper deficits every year for the next five years,” said Baker’s chief of staff, William Montgomery. “We’re trying to act swiftly and effectively to forestall that.”
The plan aims to trim $6 million from the city budget. The city will save $2.4 million dollars from the elimination of 31 jobs, 11 of which are already vacant. The other $3.6 million comes from additional spending cuts involving materials, supplies, equipment, consultants, limited-service employees, and overtime.
“If revenue needed to fund government services is not there, and is not projected to be there in the future, the city has few choices,” Baker said in a statement. “We can either cut spending to reduce the size of government or impose new taxes and fees to keep everything current. Today’s economic climate clearly dictates that we reduce the size of government, so we have made that tough choice.”
By laying off 20 workers, the city hopes to save $1.85 million. An additional $580,494 in savings will be gained by not filing the 11 currently vacant positions.
The Wilmington Police Department takes the biggest hit, losing six positions: two lieutenants, three sergeants, and a patrol officer. The choice to reduce police supervisory positions was “aimed at taking some of the administrative functions, streamlining them, combining them, deleting them,” said Montgomery. “The effort is to make cuts strategically in the administrative areas so that you do not impact the numbers out on the street and the numbers in uniform who are doing the day-to-day policing.”
Four of the positions eliminated will come from the mayor’s office, including the public safety director. The Wilmington Fire Department, the Department of Licenses and Inspections, and the Department of Parks and Recreation each will lose two positions. The legal, planning, and finance departments each will lose one position, along with the auditor’s office.
“Our goal was to try and streamline things without having a real serious impact on day-to-day services to citizens,” said Montgomery. “ It’s a tightrope and we tried to walk it.”
Some members of Wilmington City Council are expressing displeasure with the cuts.
“My biggest disappointment and frustration is that I’ve been talking to the administration for about three years now about reducing the size of city government,” said City Councilman Charles “Bud” Freel (D-At Large). “You saw the state deal with an $800 million deficit. You saw the county deal with its financial problem. But here in the city, the administration kept putting it off. If we had started dealing with that issue then, you would not see layoffs happening today. We would have been able to reduce the size of city government through attrition and through other budget cuts.”
Council members also complained that the plan was announced before City Council was briefed.
“I’m not pleased at all,” said Loretta Walsh (D- At large). “We are supposed to be co-governing. We are in this mess together, and the fact that we are being ignored by the mayor and his staff I find absolutely appalling.”
Montgomery warned that more cuts may be in the future. He emphasized that this is labeled Phase One of Baker’s plan.
“As we start building the budget for next fiscal year over December, January, and February, we’ll factor all these cuts in and see where we are,” said Montgomery. “Without knowing where the local and national economy is going in the months ahead, we can’t sit here and rule out additional cuts.”
There “will likely be additional reductions in next year’s budget,” he added.
Montgomery is hopeful that Wilmington residents will not see increased taxes and fees after both went up in each of the last two years. “With two year left in this administration, the mayor does not anticipate raising taxes again unless absolutely necessary.”
