This week, with the city euphoric from the World Series, Mayor Nutter did not joke. Instead, faced with a $1 billion deficit in five years, he ruined many a resident's lunch.
Business and wage taxes will not be raised, but citizens will enjoy no cuts until 2015, which seems a long time from now, especially in this economy. The reductions were to have made the city fiscally competitive and to stimulate growth.
So, shortly after noon, Nov. 6, 2008, the honeymoon officially ended, a year after Nutter was elected.
The city will cut 820 full-time and 2,000 part-time positions, and chop 200 unfilled police vacancies. Police overtime will be slashed. Five engine and two ladder companies will be shuttered. Plus no more underwriting the Mummers' plumage.
The city will be less clean, kind, generous. Snow plowing will stop on small streets. Bulk trash collection will end. Eleven libraries will close, some in the poorest neighborhoods. Most city pools will be drained, along with three of five ice rinks.
Golden oldies
Pennsylvania, I've long observed, is more generous to its older citizens than to its young. The same can be said of Philadelphia. The city's budget is shackled by pension payouts, costly cement shoes that impede the administration from implementing progressive initiatives.
In 2006, the city had more pensioners than active employees - 33,907 versus 28,701 - with annual compensation ranging from $29,000 to $42,000, in addition to Social Security. Most employees contributed less than 2 percent, far less than employees do in other cities.
The disparity will increase with job cuts and an aging workforce, according to the Pew Charitable Trusts and Economy League of Philadelphia's report, "Philadelphia's Quiet Crisis: The Rising Cost of Employee Benefits." By 2012, pension and retiree health-care costs are projected to devour 28 percent of the city budget.
If radical measures aren't taken, one in every four tax dollars will support retired employees - the city's past - yet we won't provide pools for children or libraries in Mantua and Fishtown. Who knows? Maybe the casinos can go there.
The kindest cuts
On Saturday, at a benefit for the Free Library of all places, I asked Mayor Nutter if I could help trim the budget. He looked alarmed - perhaps because he has chosen to hold hearings in private, perhaps because he doesn't known how well I can shop a sale - but I was serious. My thoughts:
No city cars unless they're essential for work. Take SEPTA. Bike.
The mayor and top staff are taking pay cuts. Since Council takes the summer off, their paychecks should be suspended, too.
Reduce the size of Council, beginning with the seven members who are double-dipping - or is it dripping? - through DROP, the Deferred Retirement Option Program. Don't defer retirement. Retire now.
Frank Rizzo introduced a bill to limit nepotism. No. Eliminate it. Cronyism, too. Of course, this would end Rizzo's career. And that of a third of the city's workforce.
Oh, and Latrice Bryant. Particularly after Wilson Goode Jr.'s chief legislative aide wrote that the entire summer is "a period in which I was not even contractually required to work. But I did." Gone! That's $90,000 saved. Fox29 could hire her as a commentator.
The mayor proposes a private-sector task force to increase efficiency and work with the unions, while encouraging individuals and corporations to become involved. Great. See if smart, rich people can figure out new revenue streams before next year, which is essential. That's when all four union contracts expire - those workers collect 58 cents of every city dollar - and the fighting will begin anew.
Contact staff writer Karen Heller
at 215-854-2586 or kheller@phillynews.com.
Thanks for your heretical column, Karen ... wow - actually "means test" retirees to save some money?? I wish it were politically possible. But I doubt City Council would attempt it. Far better for them to sacrifice the young and blame others for their incredible over-generosity with benefits. One statement I have to comment on is this: <> Well, that may be true of its government, but it doesn't have to be true of its people. The mayor should use his bully pulpit to get civic leaders (churches, synagogues, mosques, fraternal organizations), scouts, businesses, etc. to get people to clean up their own communities. Designate people to plow small sidestreets & shovel sidewalks. Clean up vacant lots & parks. Do it all voluntarily. Make it a matter of civic pride ... roll up our sleeves and let's get to work!!! — Paul B- The nepotism bill would not affect Rizzo. It prevents hiring of relatives, not running for office because your father was a wildly popular former mayor with his own statue in front of the Municipal Services Building. The nepotism bill really do the hard work of writing about the collection of debt owed the city, like overdue taxes. Some estimates using the city's own data put that debt at $568 million, http://www.hallwatch.org/proptax/about/redelinq/stats/summary. But to collect those taxes, the press has to be part of investigation of why some neighborhoods have 40% to 50% of all owners owing the city back taxes, http://www.hallwatch.org/proptax/about/redelinq/stats/delinqbyzip/index_html?skey=pcent&rkey=pcent. I guess that would require the press doing their job on why the city is so far out of line with collecting overdue taxes. That is really where the most critical lapse in the creation of this debt has come. It isn't folks who've been saying we need to address this all along, it's come up on us like a thief because people in positions of responsibility ignored it.— CleanupPhilly
- I meant the nepotism bill won't really do the hard work of writing about the collection of overdue debt owed the city, like overdue taxes. Why not write about sources of revenue that are going uncollected that the city needs now? http://www.hallwatch.org/proptax/about/redelinq/stats/topdelinquents/mailingaddress— CleanupPhilly
- Way to go Mayor Nutter, Get out the clippers...you could elimated 15% accross the board and there would be no difference in services. That goes for every department.....only the the rank and file people actualy doing the work should not be cut......No raises...from supervisors on up, then eliminate 15 % and cut the remianing others salary by 15%. Then start looking for further cuts department by department. The deadwood overhead is a major part of the problem.— nuggett
- Not sure why the press never seems to notice that there are serious uncollected property taxes in Philly -- http://www.hallwatch.org/proptax/about/redelinq/stats/delinqbyzip/index_html?skey=pcent&rkey=pcent -- while they come here to work, the press mostly drive home to counties where there is no property tax nonpayment rate of 40-50% in some zip codes, and there certainly would never allow deadbeats to owe the government $568 million in overdue taxes, short shrifting schools and kids. Here's the city's own data, that the pols deny, but never seem to get around to coming up with the data they claim is correct: http://www.hallwatch.org/proptax/about/redelinq/stats/summary -- hopefully good minded people will realize that foreclosure on property tax debt is the responsible course of action for the most at need citizens, kids.— CleanupPhilly
- It just baffles me that the local journalists in Philly are so unaware of how property taxes pay for the schools they send their own kids to in the suburbs, but in Philly, somehow property taxes are evil, and you can't collect them. Which is it? $568 million in property tax debt is the pendulum swinging way to far. Sheriff sale this and get make it real revenue. We can't have one set of rules for the counties, one set of rules for the city. Cities are expensive. People who live in them have to pay for them, just like you guys do in the 'burbs.— CleanupPhilly
- Heller just drives home to the 'burbs. Most of these writers for these local papers are not really city people. They have no real idea how the city pays for things, so it's easy to sing "tax! spend! borrow! panic! Shovel your own snow, take a cab to the ER!" They have no ability or interest to go up against the entrenched City Council members for not collecting property taxes. That would require actual active engagement.— CleanupPhilly
- Mayor Peanut Nutter is so full of it. He has walked all over the law as to the Sunshine Act. Is he any better then Street?????????— CD75
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