Results tagged “budgetcuts”

Remember all those cuts we talked about a few weeks back? Several of them involved some of the FREE music festivals and events we love about the city. Now, the Friends of Chicago Music are fighting back with a petition to help save those programs from being cut as the City Council tries to hash out Mayor Daley's 2010 budget plan. Swing by and sign it today. [via Pitchfork]

We're a short time away from hearing all about Mayor Daley's budget for 2010 - hint: it won't be pretty! - and Daley continues to slash at the budget like Jason Voorhees so that he can avoid raising taxes to help fill a budget gap in the neighborhood of $500 million. Items have been trickling out in the days ahead of his presentation to the City Council and now we've got a clearer idea of what's going to be cut. We already know that the city's non-union workers will be asked to take nearly five work weeks worth of furlough days (24 to be exact), that there will be no cost of living increases in wages, and at least three more reduced services days. Daley has also suggested that while money from the Skyway lease will remain untouched, he could borrow heavily from the parking meter lease to help cover the budget gap.

Stacked books, fired pages, it sounds like budget cut season has descended for Chicago-area libraries. Stocking books is a job that is usually left to library pages, but in mid-July, Mayor Richard Daley fired almost half of the 279 pages after the library employee union couldn’t agree on budget cuts. With fewer pages to help circulate books, upper-level library staff were forced to pick up the slack. The library cuts are only part of the ongoing battle between Daley and the city’s unions over projected pay cuts in order to help balance the budget. The librarians’ union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, and the Teamsters union were the only two that didn’t take pay cuts, and thus 431 city employees were let go from both unions.

An internal memo revealed non-union Chicago Public Schools staff will “have to take six unpaid furlough days this year,” adding to CPS’ woes on a local level. Earlier this week, Mayor Richard M. Daley encouraged the city’s agencies to make “such cuts,” according to a Chi-Town Daily news report. CPS Chief Executive Officer Ron Huberman was behind the July 28 memo, confirmed CPS spokeswoman Monique Bond, the report said. The memo states:

While Washington was busy trying to figure out how to leverage the federal government's largess to kick the economy back into a normal business cycle, our new governor Pat Quinn was busy restricting state spending. Facing a $9 billion deficit, Quinn has ordered state agencies to cut spending by one percent, exempting education, has ordered that job vacancies not be filled, and is curtailing spending on travel and equipment. "Nobody likes to cut back, but sometimes that's what's necessary," Quinn said. "We have to make sure that state government is lean and cuts cost wherever it can."

The same City Hall that's shelling out almost $60 million for new SUVs is now telling us they don't have enough money to plow and salt side streets in a timely fashion. Streets and Sanitation Cmdr. Mike Picardi said that less salt is being used and side streets may have to wait longer to be plowed in an effort to save money, citing yesterday's snow as an example: according to Picardi, it cost the city $500,000 to salt and plow the city's streets.

The Streets and San boss says that, to save money on overtime costs, he’ll delay sending salt trucks and plows onto side streets after a weekend snowfall, unless conditions on the side streets become dangerous.

Continue reading "City Cutting Side Street Plowing"

Photo by BrianHagy
• The Blago probe has another victim: William Cellini, who was indicted by a Federal grand jury today for planning to extort Hollywood producer Thomas Rosenberg for money for the Blago campaign.
• Two people were severely injured in a fire after an explosion at Gigi's Restaurant in Naperville last night.
• Cook County Board President Todd Stroger promises his new spending plan, introduced next month, won't include any new taxes.

The latest victims of Mayor Daley's 2009 budget? The Chicago Jazz and Blues Fests, each of which will be shortened from four to three days in an effort to save money; the number of stages at both fests will also be reduced. Those aren't the only fests being reduced: the Holiday Sports Festival is being reduced to two days and Great Chicago Places and Spaces, the Viva Latin Music Festival, Celtic Fest and the Mayor's Cup Soccer Festival will all probably be cut to one day. Megan McDonald, executive director of the Mayor’s Office of Special Events, said, “To be frank, we simply cannot continue moving forward with programs, events and festivals that cost the city of Chicago more to operate than we bring in in revenue...This relates specifically to stages, tents, service areas and contractual services rendered at each event."

Mayor Daley’s chief-of-staff Lori Healey, Chief Financial Officer Paul Volpe and Intergovernmental Affairs Director John Dunn met Tuesday with 40 union leaders that represent city workers. Top of the agenda? The more than $400 million projected hole in next year's city budget. "We’re looking at workforce reductions. We’re looking at a significant, almost restructuring of the way we deliver and get services and the number of agencies we have," the Sun-Times says Healy was overheard saying. "This is not an exercise where we’ve said to department heads, ‘Cut a bunch of people and give us their names.’ We’re gonna…find areas and functions that don’t make sense...It’s not focussed at unions. Managers, commissioners, deputy commissioners," will be included.

If the $1.4 billion in budget cuts to social programs stand, the blame falls squarely on the House, said Senate President (and Blago buddy) Emil Jones. "We have to have a balanced budget," Jones said Thursday. "I'm not going to get involved in playing silly games and giving false hopes to people when the money isn’t there. I support many of the programs that got cut. But we in the Senate also supported the revenue to support the budget. That’s why we passed the revenue to support the budget in May. Now, if the House was genuinely sincere about passing those programs, then they in turn would pass the revenue to support it." The House voted to override the governor's budget cuts, but Jones says that he won't let the same happen.