budget
“SAVE BERTH 55″ CAMPAIGN COMES TO CITY COUNCIL TO FIND IT MUST COME BACK
After citizens from Save Berth 55 waited long and patiently for the Long Beach City Council to reach item No. 22.1 on Tuesday night's agenda, Councilmember Gary DeLong immediately moved that the the issue be postponed until the same time next at the request of the Port of Long Beach.
LOCAL NORM: GRANTING LB SERENITY TO ACCEPT WHAT IT CAN’T CHANGE
"We're pioneering new ways to keep our citizens blissfully ignorant and thereby assure their absolute and total happiness, which is our only concern," City Manager Pat West said serenely after enacting the budget handed down from his Higher Power.
CITY MANAGER SEEKS AUTHORITY TO SIGN $250,000 CONTRACTS WITHOUT APPROVAL
The budget proposed by City Manager Pat West for fiscal year 2013 includes a line item that would give West—or any succeeding Long Beach city manager—the authority to enter spending agreements of up to $250,000 without the approval of the City Council. The current limit is $100,000. The implications of the proposed change go beyond money and [...]
ONE QUESTION … FOR COUNCIL’S BUDGET OVERSIGHT CHAIR, GARY DELONG
Ten years after consultants informed the Long Beach City Council that it was spending more than it was taking in, Kerrie Aley has one question for Councilmember Gary DeLong, chairman of the Budget Oversight Committee: Is Long Beach in better or worse financial shape now?
DOWNEY LAYING OFF STAFF ON ONE SIDE, PAYING OFF RETIREES ON THE OTHER
DOWNEY (Via DowneyBeat.com)—While the City of Downey is laying off employees and trying to plug a multi-million budget hole, documents show it has also been writing checks for six-figure, lump-sum retirement payouts. More than $249,000 in unused vacation and sick time was recently paid to former Fire Chief and Emergency Services Coordinator Mark Sauter, who retired [...]
COMPTON BUDGET MEANS LAYOFFS, LAWSUITS, MAYBE INSOLVENCY, ANYWAY
[EDITOR'S NOTE: This story was written by Abby Sewell of the Los Angeles Times] COMPTON (via Los Angeles Times)—After a chaotic meeting full of reversals, the Compton City Council late Tuesday apparently moved to approve dozens of layoffs to avert a potential government shutdown. The council, acting as the redevelopment commission, voted 3 to 2 [...]
IT TAKES JUGGLING, BUT DOWNEY BUDGET WON’T CUT PROGRAMS OR SERVICES
After a public hearing on June 28, the Downey City Council is expected to approve a $143.6 million budget that will plug a $1.7-million deficit by using the city’s reserves, but will not reduce any city programs or services, although 34 budgeted and/or unoccupied jobs will be permanently eliminated. The city’s reserves are projected at [...]
NORWALK, DOWNEY TO BEGIN 2011 WITH PART-TIME CITY MANAGERS
The cities of Norwalk and Downey will be led by part-time city managers for the immediate future, saving both cities some money while still receiving experienced managerial talents. Downey City Manager Gerald Caton, who had planned to retire at the end of 2011, has advanced his full-time departure by 12 months, thus saving the city [...]
‘REVOLUTION’ OF PROP 25 WILL LIKELY LEAVE LEGISLATORS SPINNING IN PLACE
Most Democrats and Republicans in the Legislature don't think Prop 25 will translate into anything new. Despite its promise to end budgetary gridlock, they suspect Prop 25 will ultimately translate into the very same budget shambles we’ve been enduring for so long.
FOUR LB COUNCIL MEMBERS WANT TO TALK ABOUT MAYOR FOSTER’S SURPRISE VETO OF HIS OWN BUDGET
Four members of the Long Beach City Council — Patrick O’Donnell, Gerrie Schipske, Rae Gabelich and Steve Neal — have placed an item on the September 28 meeting agenda to “consider and discuss” and potentially attempt to override Mayor Bob Foster’s veto of one percent of the general fund spending in the city manager’s proposed [...]
COUNCIL’S NEW BUDGET SLASHES POLICE AND FIRE STAFFING LEVELS
The Long Beach City Council voted 8-0 Tuesday night—Suja Lowenthal was absent, vacationing in India—to adopt a fiscal year 2011 budget that cuts 64 sworn budgeted police positions from Long Beach Police Department officers available for citywide deployment and cuts the Long Beach Fire Department budget to the point that its management says there will [...]
LBREPORT.COM EDITORIAL: HOW TO KEEP SUMMER BAND CONCERTS IN OUR PARKS
Long Beach needn’t lose the summertime experience of bringing a blanket to the park and enjoying a big old-fashioned band—with trumpets, trombones, flutes, tubas, clarinets, saxophones and percussion (and even a glockenspiel)—playing everything from great American standards to Sousa marches. The music is priceless, but it has become prohibitive to have professional musicians play it. [...]
VECTOR CONTROL: FROM HERE, BIG DRUG BUST MEANS END OF LB BUDGET PROBLEM
Here's the way it goes: we seize the drugs, we sell the drugs back into the drug community, and then we seize the drugs again to sell them again. A perfect machine, as it was when Ronald Reagan first developed the scam in the ‘80s.
