City Council approves final budget

June Casagrande

A momentous feat went practically unnoticed this week as the City

Council finalized and approved the city’s 2003-04 budget.

Long after the network TV crews left Tuesday night’s council

meeting, cameras full of footage on the controversy surrounding

Councilman Dick Nichols, the council was scrutinizing last-minute

spending requests, listening to some alarming statistics on

increasing costs for employee retirement benefits and ultimately

casting a unanimous vote to approve the city’s the $162-million

spending plan right on time.

“There have been six hours of public discussions on this so far,”

Mayor Steve Bromberg said as the council entered its final discussion

of the matter on Tuesday night.

In response to a request by resident Ron Winship at the June 10

council meeting, city staff reported this week that the cost of

employee retirement packages is expected to skyrocket.

For the coming fiscal year, the city will pay about $9.5 million

into the Public Employee Retirement System, a state-run fund that

pays retirement benefits for many public employees. Next year, the

amount that the city must pay into the retirement system will rise to

$14 million. In 2005-06, it will likely increase at an even greater

rate.

“It’s going to hurt, no question about it,” City Manager Homer

Bludau said Thursday.

Because police, fire and other safety employees get benefits about

six times that of other city employees, retirement costs for this

group represent the bulk of the city’s costs. Of the $9.5 million to

be spent in the coming year, about $7 million is for these safety

employees.

Because of the continuing economic downturn, the budget is a

status quo spending package with little room for play and, thus,

little room for debate. A few final supplemental spending requests

created only minor controversy among council members Tuesday.

Bromberg and Councilman Tod Ridgeway hammered out a compromise on

how to help out the Corona del Mar Business Improvement District.

Ridgeway said it was inappropriate for the city to pay $6,750 to

cover half the cost of printing the business directory.

“I think underwriting a chamber of commerce is inappropriate,”

Bromberg said.

After some back and forth, he agreed to chip in $5,000 for the

annual Corona del Mar Scenic 5K Race and another $10,000 for the

annual Christmas Walk. Bromberg also agreed to drop the request to

help fund the directory, but promised to try to commit a little of

his annual discretionary budget funds for the district.

“They’ve done so much for the city, they deserve this,” Bromberg

said. “It won’t be much, but it will be something.”

Gary Proctor got his wish for funding for two projects in his

district: $60,000 for some dredging in the West Newport waters for

environmental and navigational improvements and another $15,000 for

the West Newport Rejuvenation Project.

Proctor said he hopes the money will set in motion future

beautification projects for the area.