How to balance the county budget?

We are rounding the corner this summer and will be completing a full year of declared recession. With Sheboygan’s unemployment at over 12%, we know that the local situation will get worse in the coming months as unemployment compensation runs out for many. Even if there are some economic upturns, their impact may take months to arrive here.

City leaders have begun calculating Sheboygan’s 2010 Budget, and this will be more challenging due to an estimated $2.3 million deficit caused by revenue shortfalls, a 3% cut in state funding, a $100,000 increase in tipping fees for garbage, and a mandated $600,000 supplement for stock market losses in our state pension funds.

There are many ways to plan a budget: cut all spending by the same percentage as lost revenue; cut services and/or departments to eliminate recurring expenses; find new revenues through additional fees and taxes; take on additional debt to cover shortfalls in revenue; run the city on a skeleton budget with no capital money for improvements, maintenance or projects; hammer away at personnel costs including wages, benefits, and hours; or seek new efficiencies that will save costs in all departments by evaluating present staffing, services, policies and procedures. None of these ways is a solution in itself, and some would require taking much more time and research than others.

I also believe that we are not in a short-term recession that will turn around next year. I think this economic downturn indicates the need for some fundamental changes in our thinking and perception about sustainable growth, consumption and accountability in our society. Addressing these questions has huge implications for how we plan as a city or nation, and simply will not be settled when this year’s budget gets passed in the Common Council or in Congress. These questions are far-reaching and fundamental to the purpose and responsibilities of government, and what we as citizens and society expect government to be and do.

Even with so much access to information through the media and internet, we struggle establishing the best priorities that will carry our institutions forward for the next generation. Setting budgets is not just working with numbers so that everything balances numerically. It requires us to determine what is of value, what is worth sustaining and developing with the resources we have. It requires us to determine our vision of Sheboygan’s future, and how much we’re willing to invest now for that future? Ain’t so?