I am beginning to feel like my brother (Maj. Mark A. Smith, U.S. Army, ret., and essayist for this newspaper), talking about what really happened in Vietnam.
Since I never was in Vietnam, I guess I can only talk about what really happened in Culver City.
The City Council and the community should take very seriously Paul Ehrlich’s State of the City Finances address at last last week’s City Council meeting.
Let me tackle some of Mr. Ehrlich’s questions because chances are he will never hear back from the City Council or the city staff.
The first item is Quarterly Financial Statements. You never will see these on time because, if they come from the Accounting Dept., they are too accurate a document as to where the money is actually spent.
These documents have to be changed, showing only a bottom-line figure, because money is moved between accounts. The city has posted on its website the preliminary end of the fiscal year 2007/’08 final statement showing that the city spent 97 percent of the General Fund Budget.
Final Accounting Not Ready
This is a preliminary report . The final year in figures are usually not all in until September or October. It has been my experience that the figure is an additional 5 percent. That would only put the city 2 percent over their budget ending June 30, 2008, or approximately 1.7 million taxpayer dollars.
Oh!
I forgot to tell you, as city staff forgets to tell you each year, they budget 5 percent, or approximately $4.5 million over their projected costs, as a buffer for unexpected cost and a surplus of 3 percent, or approximately $2.8 million, to carry over to the next year.
What does this mean to the city of Culver City’s state of finances? Well, not knowing what the city has actually spent because of the lack of up-to-date financial data, we must rely on what city staff gives us, the final, approved budgets on the website and the preliminary year-end financial statement for ‘07/’08.
What do we know from these documents?
1. The $4.5 million from ‘07/’08 is gone
2. The minimum $1.7 million over budget is gone for ‘07/’08
3. The $2.8 million carryover for the ‘08/’09 budget is gone.
What does all this mean to the city?
Simply put, if the city immediately took action to strictly limit their spending to what is budgeted in the ‘08/’09 budget document, and not a penny more, you will only be approximately $9 million short on June 30m 2009.
This is why I have stated in the past those things need to be done now and not tomorrow.
City staff sold the city on the two-year budget program, which allows them to move money around in a two-year period with minimal oversight.
The house of cards is about to fall.
If the city continues on this path, on June 23, 2009, City Manager Jerry Fulwood will retire, the City Council will approve a new two-year budget for ‘09/’10 and ‘10/’11, completed by Mr. Fulwood and by the new City Manager he will help select.
In November of 2009, when the city realizes what happened to them, you will have wished you listened to Mr. Ehrlich on that Monday night in December of 2008.
What Layoffs?
There has been a lot of talk lately about hiring freezes and city workers layoffs. Contrary to what the community has been told about layoffs of city workers, I, for one, in my 31 years with the city cannot name a single worker who has been laid off.
I have seen positions eliminated after someone retires, after someone leaves city employment or employees are moved to other positions in the city — but never any layoffs.
Under Civil Service rules, employees laid off are put on a rehire list for two years. They are the first ones offered employment as new openings occur.
Ask city personnel to see these lists for the past 31 years. Maybe I missed someone.
The city not only needs a hiring freeze, they also need a promotional freeze.
A good example happened in March of 2005.
Mr. Fulwood went to all of the city departments and asked for our input into where we could cut the budget.
In the Police Dept., we knew we were extremely top heavy in management position. The No. 1 cut we proposed was the position of Assistant Chief.
We proposed eliminating the position and operating the Police Dept. with two bureaus, as it was in 1977.
In April of 2005, the current Assistant Chief and acting Police Chief presented this plan to Mr. Fulwood. When he returned from City Hall, that position was removed from budget cuts and more vital police positions were cut.
They Have a Second Chance
The Assistant Police Chief position will again be vacant this month. Someone new will move into that position at a cost of approximately $250,000 a year. The amount of money the city could have saved if this position had been cut, from June 30, 2005 until December 31, 2008, is $1.1 million.
The city has a very accurate and expensive accounting computer system capable of generating comprehensive reports within hours, not months.
They can tell you how much has been spent from each account, where it went and how much was left in each account.
City Council, take a look for yourself.
Everything that I have discussed has nothing to do with the critical financial times that we are currently in and what types of cuts the city may have to make in the future or now.
Our country’s poor financial situation has only exposed the fiscal mismanagement that has gone on for years in Culver City government.
I will conclude with Mr. Ehrlich’s statement No. 5 in his report:
“Take immediate action if the near-term and future projections warrant such a hard hiring freeze (including fire and police).”
Greg Smith retired last year after more than 30 years with the Police Dept. He may be contacted at scsinvest@sbcglobal.net
