Saturday's Budget workshop meeting :
This Saturday, January 30th, 9:30am-5pm City Hall. The city council will be meeting with the city department directors to ask questions in regards to the budget. The public can attend but will not be provided the opportunity to speak. The Hoboken Revolt Steering Committee submitted the following questions to our council representatives. We strongly encourage all members to contact the council with the questions you want answered!
1. Personnel Costs. We would like to see comparisons from 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010 budgets from department heads for all municipal employees with the following details: Salaries, Headcount by Department, Healthcare Costs, Cell Phones (for who, and at what cost), City Vehicles (who has them, how many are there and what are the costs). We would like to hear how each department benchmarks their budget and headcount based on other municipalities.
2. Pilots. We would like to hear an update on the management of current pilots. Is the city receiving the appropriate revenue streams? Which pilots are in arrears and how will that be corrected? What is the status on the Church Towers pilot in regards to compliance with a HUD program?
3. Reassessments and Revaluation. What is the status on assessment challenges and impact on revenue for 2010 and 2011. Are there assumptions in the budget to account for those who win assessment challenges? What is the status on revaluation?
4. Debt Management. What amount of debt should a city like ours incur? How to do we compare to other comparable cities? What percentage of the budget is dedicated to infrastructure update? What is going on with the municipal garage? What are the tax implications of the hospital closing? and, of the hospital staying open?
5. Future Budgets. There is no election in the upcoming year. Can we get a commitment from the council to begin working on the 2011 budget in a timely way to insure adoption by the fall of 2010? If not, why?
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