* $7.8 million: two-week furlough for all employees
* $1.9 million: cut/delay purchase of Fire Department supplies and continue civilian layoffs
* $1 million: reduction of fund for LB 775 job-creation refunds
* $665,000: civilian employee wage freeze
* $200,000: removal of four finance positions because entertainment tax failed
* $60,000: City Council wage freezes, elimination of one staff vacancy
* $25,000: reduction from Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce's Target Omaha program.
Calling tax increases a last resort, five Omaha City Council members today announced a plan to cut nearly $11.7 million from next year's city budget.
The biggest part of their plan is a two-week furlough for all city employees, including police and fire employees. The council members said the furloughs would save the city an estimated $7.8 million next year.
The plan comes the day after the council shot down Mayor Jim Suttle's proposed entertainment tax on a 6-1 vote. Councilman Ben Gray was the sole member voting for the tax.
Announcing the new proposed cuts were Council members Pete Festersen, Garry Gernandt, Chuck Sigerson, Jean Stothert and Franklin Thompson. They said the furlough would allow the city to spread the pain of budget cuts to all departments. “This is truly a joint effort,” Festersen said.
The five said the furloughs and other cuts also would provide enough money to reopen the Florence library and to restore pool hours, operation of the police helicopter unit in 2010 and funding for several nonprofit organizations.
The furloughs would need to be negotiated with the public safety unions and the other employee unions. The council members urged Suttle to negotiate the furloughs with the unions.
Suttle said today he would listen to the council's ideas for addressing budget problems, noting the furlough would require union approval.
“We have said all along that we are going to be open-minded on this,” Suttle said.
Responding to the proposal, Interim Police Chief Alex Hayes said such personnel reductions "would have a significant impact on the operations of the Omaha Police Department and public safety."
He said the furloughs would be the equivalent of losing 30 officers and six civilian employees for an entire year. Hayes also said the department currently is short 70 officers and 23 civilians from its budgeted strength and could lose 70 who are eligible for retirement in January.
"With our current staffing levels, we have been able to maintain a professional level of public safety for the citizens of Omaha, but have had to use overtime to address public safety concerns, to include suppressing violence and answering 911 calls for service. With this proposal, we anticipate that overtime costs will increase," he said.
"Further, due to the unpredictable nature of police work, if the furloughs were implemented, it would require us, at a minimum, to move detectives to uniform patrol, thereby decreasing the ability of the department to conduct timely investigations," the chief said.
The Omaha Police Union was skeptical about the furlough plan. Union President Aaron Hanson said overtime costs would increase because police would still need to respond to 911 calls, and crimes still would need to be investigated.
“It's going to either happen with officers on the street or overtime,” Hanson said of that workload. “My fear is that the unintended consequences would be a significant increase in overtime.”
Fire Union President Steve LeClair said issues like furloughs and minimum fire truck staffing still would need to be negotiated. Suttle said Wednesday he and the firefighters union were weeks away from finalizing all areas of the contract.
Suttle, however, announced today that the fire union had agreed to a wage freeze for 2009-10. LeClair said the council was asking a lot of firefighters, in light of that freeze. “I don't know what more they want,” he said. “They got zero-zero.”
Festersen, responding to staffing concerns, said the council members were asking managers to be creative on how they staff their departments. He noted that employees would not have to take the two-week furlough all at once.
Omaha's largest civilian union agreed last week to wage freezes for 2009, 2010 and 2011. The mayor also has asked for a police union wage freeze.
In addition to the furlough plan, the council members propose cutting about $1.9 million from the Fire Deparment, including holding off on buying a new aerial truck. Councilman Chris Jerram proposed many of those cuts last week. Jerram was traveling today and could not be reached for comment on the furlough proposal.
Gray said he disagreed with his colleagues' budget cut package but declined to elaborate on his opposition. He said Tuesday, in backing the entertainment tax proposal, that the city needs to find a way to generate additional revenue to deal with its budget problems.
Suttle proposed the 2 percent entertainment tax as part of his 2010 budget plan. The tax would have applied to restaurant and bar tabs, amusement parks, concessions and movie tickets, among other items.
Omaha has already closed pools, cut library hours and announced plans to ground the police helicopters to make up for budget shortfalls this year and next.
Council members and the Mayor's Office had offered more than a half-dozen amendments to the entertainment tax, including raising or lowering the proposed tax and adding a four-year sunset clause. The tax was estimated to generate $9 million a year for the city.
But the council instead rejected the ordinance outright.
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