Driscoll 'Disappointed' Committee Wants to 'Politicize' Budget Process

Mayor Kimberley Driscoll, responding to , said Friday she is disappointed that council members “want to politicize the budget process.”

She called the measure approved Thursday night by the Council Committee on Ordinances, Licenses and Legal Affairs to be unnecessary.

The committee, chaired by Councilor-at-Large Joan Lovely, voted unanimously to change the budget process next year to require that the Council vote by early February on how much of a tax increase it will allow for the budget the mayor submits in May.

“I’m disappointed the Council wants to politicize the budget process,” Driscoll said. “Since taking office, we’ve worked hard together — the mayor and the council — to restore the city’s finances. That has not been easy. Over the years, we’ve cut spending, laid-off personnel and consolidated departments to ensure that the city has a balanced budget.”

The mayor said the city will continue to face new budgetary challenges with the recent announcement of the power plant’s closure.

Sponsored by Ward 5 Councilor John Ronan, the measure is designed to “get a hold,” he said, of the rising tax burden on Salem property owners. The measure now goes to the full council, possibly by next Thursday. Lovely will ask the city solicitor to review the proposed measure before it goes to the full council.

Ronan said he was surprised that the measure passed the committee unanimously. He said he expects that there will be more opposition to the proposed change in the process when the full council debates the measure.

Councilor-at-Large Thomas Furey cautioned that the proposed measure would “put the mayor in a strait jacket.”

Driscoll said, “If the council feels the need to 'strait jacket' the mayor, they don’t need an ordinance to do that. Each and every year the council’s main job is to approve the city budget. We can’t spend one dollar without their approval. If they believe the cost of city services are too high they can cut the budget.”

She said the measure is troubling because it “smacks of the types of budget games that got this city into trouble in the past. The job is hard enough without these games. I’ll continue to submit lean and balanced budgets aimed at meeting the city’s needs and keeping Salem affordable.”

Ronan and other council members argued Thursday that the tax bill on Salem residents is too high, largely because the city maximizes the annual tax levy each year.

At the council committee meeting Thursday night, Ronan presented 16 charts that he said demonstrated that the tax burden on residents has risen every year for 20 years. According to the charts Ronan presented, the average single family property tax bill in the early 1990s was $1,516. In 2011, it is $4,467, he said.

“Our working class people are getting stuck with a very high tax bill,” Ronan said.

Ronan explained through his charts and the mayor's budget that the tax increase this year, if the budget is approved without significant cuts, will have to be 3.98 percent, not 21/2 percent as most residents believe.

The city is collecting $72,532,237 in taxes this year. That is $460,892 less than the maximum amount allowed this year under state law.

So for the 2012 budget, the city can raise taxes by 2 1/2 percent, which adds $1,813,305. It can also include the $460,892 left over from last year. And it can include $600,000 in new growth.

That means Salem can collect for next year a total of $75,417,957 or 3.98 percent more than it is collecting this year, Ronan explained.

Mayor Kimberley Driscoll's budget, anticipating that city revenues will grow again this year, proposes to spend all of the $75,417,957 it can assess.

The mayor said if the council really wanted to cut city expenses, it missed an opportunity when it building.

“If the majority of the council cared about saving the city money they would have approved the city hall annex lease and saved the city $67,000 per year,” she said.