Projects delayed, old cars staying

Costa Mesa will proceed with a plan to save roughly $8.4 million by not filling staff vacancies, delaying street and park improvement projects and holding off on replacing aging fire and police vehicles, among other things.

Department executives say that residents won’t see any noticeable decline in services.

At Wednesday’s City Council study session, the council was presented with the proposal, and representatives from every department facing budget cuts were there to answer questions and concerns.

Councilwoman Katrina Foley went through the proposal line by line, asking for explanations of many of the items on the chopping block and questioning whether the city could do without them.

Nonetheless, there were no calls for significant changes to the proposal, and City Manager Allan Roeder said that it will go forward in a manner very similar to that laid out in the proposal.

A large portion of the debate, however, centered on the salaries and benefits for city employees.

Councilman-Elect Gary Monahan and Mayor Pro Tem Allan Mansoor led the charge by requesting information on the possible impacts of cutting city staff, police and fire department salaries, reducing retirement benefits and putting a freeze on hiring.

All of these things are governed by contracts that the city negotiates with employee unions, and thus are not easy to change, but Mansoor said that reducing those expenditures still needs to be looked into.

“I fee like we need to look at all our options,” Mansoor said. “They’re not pleasant questions, but it would not be financially responsible not to ask them.”

Katrina Foley said that it would be a bad idea to cut employee pay and benefits and reduce staffing while the economy suffers.

“As part of this discussion we have to take into consideration that the residents in our city have service needs. What I hear is that people want more, they don’t want less,” Foley said.

She criticized Mansoor’s and Monahan’s actions as overreactions that could end up having adverse effects on the city’s financial situation in the future.

Roeder was surprised that the conversation took the turn that it did so early in the fiscal year, but he said that sooner or later he knew that the issues of city employee salaries and benefits would be discussed.

“It’s 85% of our budget, so it’s understandable that [the council] would want to look at those expenses,” Roeder said.

ALAN BLANK may be reached at (714) 966-4623 or at alan.blank@latimes.com.