Feet to the fire

City staff members spent “hundreds of hours” each trying to reduce a 12.5 tax increase and have managed to bring the city budget down “by some $2.1 million,” deputy mayor Peter Chirico said at Monday night’s committee meeting of council.

Through the efforts of staff and council committees, Chirico said, the projected tax increase has now been cut to around eight per cent.

“We’re still waiting to finalize reductions from the ABCs, and at this point in time we’re not exactly sure where we are but we know they are working on their budgets to reduce this further,” said Chirico, who added more numbers should be available by Thursday night’s budget meeting.

Less than that
While Chirico was “very pleased,” the eight per cent figure "is not the final number,” he said after publicly thanking staff members “for their hard work.”

Mayor Vic Fedeli also served up kudos to employees involved in the budget process.

“You handed a binder to this new crew that said 12.5 per cent and we turned you right around and said ‘go figure out how to make it a hell of a lot less than that’ and you’ve done a phenomenal job.”

At the same time, Fedeli said, he hopes Chirico will put the feet of the agencies, boards and commissions “to the fire.”

“This is no an exoneration that says ‘ABCs don’t worry any more, we’re down to eight per cent.’ I’m not satisfied at eight.”