Council cuts two positions

Published 9:41 am Friday, June 25, 2010

By ED MERRIMAN

Baker City Herald

The fallout from the Baker City Budget Committee’s $105,000 cut that

ended Gene Stackle’s job as economic development manager evolved into

the elimination of the entire community and economic development

department.

The result is the termination of Jennifer Watkins, a 12-year city

employee whose job titles included community and economic development

director and assistant city manager.

The City Council made the changes Wednesday night when it adopted the budget for the fiscal year that starts July 1.

The Council was originally scheduled to pass the budget during Tuesday’s regular meeting.

But Mayor Dennis Dorrah recessed that meeting until Wednesday to give Councilor Aletha Bonebrake and City Manager Steve Bogart time to modify the budget resolution to offset the loss of $136,000 in lodging taxes.

The Baker County Board of Commissioners decided to keep that money in county coffers after the city budget committee eliminated Stackle’s position.

Lodging taxes are supposed to be spent to promote Baker County’s economy.

The Council adopted the budget by a 5-2 vote, with Milo Pope and Sam Bass voting no.

Councilor Gail Duman, who was appointed Tuesday to replace Andrew Bryan, who resigned May 28, voted in favor of the budget resolution.

Pope and Bass argued for reducing the city’s cash reserves by $136,000 instead of cutting Watkins’ position.

But Pope said that in the end he felt his opposition was akin to “pissing in the wind” because he believes a majority of the Council was intent on making staff cuts to reach their goal of increasing the cash reserve.

That reserve, also known as the unappropriated ending fund balance, was set at $904,000 in the preliminary budget approved the city’s budget committee on June 1.

But changes in the final budget the Council adopted Wednesday reduced that figure by $136,000 (the loss of lodging tax revenue) and $49,772 (to retain the code enforcement officer in the Police Department).

Jeanie Dexter, the city’s finance director, said those losses of revenue were partially offset by a net savings of $53,775 from eliminating Watkins’ job and closing the community and economic development department.

Watkins’ salary was $74,196, and Stackle’s $67,486.

The Council also decided Wednesday to take $50,000 from cash reserves to the contingency fund; that money could be sent to the county, under an intergovernmental agreement, to help the county’s economic development efforts in the city.

The net result of the changes is that the cash reserve, money that can’t be spent unless the city approves a supplemental budget, totals $722,852 – about $182,000 less than what the Budget Committee proposed.

The city’s reserves over the past four years were in the $1.8 million to $2.3 million range.

Pope pointed out that the original proposed submitted by Bogart had a reserve of about $671,000 – about $60,000 less than the budget the Council adopted – yet the original budget didn’t eliminate Stackle’s or Watkins’ jobs or eliminate the community and economic development department.

He also noted that the budget the Council adopted Wednesday does not include money to replace Police Lt. Brian Harvey, who left the city to take the job as La Grande’s Police Chief.

“For that $60,000 you lose three people,” Bass said. “Hey people, if we are that hard up we ought to take out a loan.”

“The only change I had in my (proposed) budget was a reduction in hours in economic development, and the loss of janitorial service,” Bogart said.

The Police Department wound up with 14 sworn officers and one code enforcement officer, down one from 15 sworn officers at the beginning of the year.

Police Chief Wyn Lohner said he would like to have seen enough money to bring staffing back to 15 sworn officers, including a lieutenant’s position that has gone unfilled since April when Harvey moved to La Grande.

However, Lohner said 14 sworn officers is one more than the 13 included in the Budget Committee’s June 1 proposal – at that level the city would have had only one officer on patrol on some nights.

Councilor Beverly Calder said Wednesday that she thinks Pope and Bass mischaracterized the budget cuts.

“Economic development is not lost, it is shifting to the county,” Calder said, adding that she didn’t believe there would be a net loss of jobs because someone will be hired or contracted by the county to handle economic and community development for the county, which will include work on behalf of the city.

“I have immense trust the county will provide excellent economic development,” Calder said.

Baker City has about 60 percent of the county’s population, and a larger percentage of the motels and other lodging businesses that collect the lodging tax from their customers.

Calder said she doesn’t consider the lack of money to replace Harvey as a reduction in positions because the lieutenant’s position had not been filled.

“I just want to say thanks to the budget committee,” Duman said.

“These are not easy times that we are having to go through,” she said. “These are hard times. Look at what the state is going through.”

Pope disagreed, saying, “Contrary to Mrs. Duman’s comment, what the budget committee did was not good.”

He said the city would have been better of with Bogart’s proposed budget.

Replacing Watkins and Stackle will be difficult, Pope contends.

After the Council voted Wednesday, Bogart said: “Thank you for adopting this budget. It certainly is not what I had recommended or hoped for. Nevertheless I applaud the Council’s efforts.”

Calder said the Council’s No. 1 goal was to consolidate services and provide the same level of services with less taxes.

“We accomplished that,” Calder said.

“Our goals was to not run a deficit,” Bonebrake said. “We didn’t want to keep going in the hole $100,000 year after year.”

“The city is not getting out of the economic development business,” Dorrah said. “We are going back to the way it was done three or four years ago, when the county handled economic development and the city contributes to that economic development, and we benefit from that.”

Dorrah said he has heard negative comments about cutting Watkins and Stackle from the staff, but he said they might be able to bid for an economic development contract with the county.

Fred Warner Jr., chairman of the Baker County Board of Commissioners, said Thursday that he hasn’t spoken to Watkins or Stackle about that possibility.

Warner said county officials haven’t decided how to spend the $136,000 in lodging taxes the county will keep rather than transfer to the city.

The county might use some of that money to operate Ski Anthony Lakes. The ski area’s owners earlier this month asked the county to take over the business.