Supporters of the Emporia Municipal Band asked for a little more money Tuesday night in the last of a series of public forums on the 2008 city budget.
Earlier versions of the budget had cut the band’s $15,000 funding entirely. The current draft sets aside $7,500 for the group, which some band supporters said was still too low.
“I think the amount that has been proposed is hopelessly inadequate and a little insulting,” Larry Alderson, a long-time band member, told city commissioners in the forum held at First Christian Church.
The city’s present budget proposal is an attempt to balance the budget without raising taxes. City Manager Matt Zimmerman said this version tries to make the cuts shallow and broad, spreading the pain around without going too deep.
Much of the band’s money goes to pay the musicians, who get between $20 and $40 for a concert if they also attend the week’s rehearsal. The highest pay rate only goes to musicians who have been with the band more than 20 years.
Band member James Hill said the wages come to about $7 an hour, which he called equivalent to a babysitter or fast-food employee.
“The only difference between the musicians and those people is they don’t have to ask ‘Do you want fries with that march?’” said Hill, who has been with the band for more than 50 years.
The band’s money is also used to buy music and stands, to pay director Gary McCarty and announcer Roger Hartsook, and to save money to buy large instruments that are presently borrowed from the Emporia school district.
As a nonprofit, Hill said he didn’t think the band was allowed to do its own fund-raising. Others at the meeting quickly disputed that and said a nonprofit band could help itself if it wanted to.
“Why doesn’t the band raise its own money?” county resident Jan Jaggard said. “It’s not the job of the city to pay for a band.”
More objections
Jaggard, a former Didde employee, was among those left jobless when the company announced massive layoffs in 2000, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and eventually shut down altogether in 2001.
She had to learn how to live on a lean budget, she said, which included learning the difference between wants and needs.
The band, she said, was a want. In her view so was the taxi coupon service, which the city may reduce funding for this year. The coupons allow cheaper fares for elderly, poor and disabled riders.
“You never turn your back on people who need your help,” Jaggard acknowledged. “But how many options do you need? The bus service works very well.”
Ray Terrell, meanwhile, asked why most golf fees were going up by 10 percent when the rates were already fairly expensive. Money could be saved and a more challenging course created, he said, by allowing more rough to grow.
“The present course superintendent, it seems like all he wants to do is mow, mow, mow,” he said.
Zimmerman said the city believed its fees to be competitive. The city was discussing some changes at the course, he added, including not only rough areas but also a larger pond that could cut water costs and improve play.
In response to other questions by Terrell, Zimmerman said Emporia was looking at a rental fee for its parks. A fee for the zoo was considered, he said, but to do it without hurting attendance would require a rate that wouldn’t even pay for the ticket-taker.
“We are one of only five zoos in the Midwest that doesn’t charge a fee, so that is something we have to consider,” he acknowledged.
Nina West asked how much city reserves need to be built up and whether some of the money slated for reserves could be used on projects like the heating and cooling controls for White Auditorium.
Zimmerman answered that, unlike some prior drafts, the current version of the proposed budget puts no additional money into the reserves beyond the $383,000 already there.
Commissioner Jeff Longbine said that amount was thinner than he really wanted it to be.
“That’s about 10 days worth of operating funds,” he said. “I don’t know many entities, whether they’re families, households, businesses or municipalities that can comfortably operate on 10 days’ reserve.
“If the boiler went down and we had absolutely no reserves, we’d have to bond it, and I don’t think that’s good fiscal policy,” he said.
Some criticized a proposed fee for fire service, or proposed cuts to the city’s health insurance and worker’s compensation funds. Commissioners have also been uncomfortable with those proposed changes and seem unwilling to make the cuts.
But Longbine said the three items together equal about one mill of property tax.
County programs questioned
Proposed county budgets also provoked discussion. Former county commissioner Myron Van Gundy suggested the county might save some money by cuts to its social programs.
“They’re all good programs that all have very good people,” Van Gundy said. “But I don’t know if it’s the duty of the taxpayers of Lyon County and the city of Emporia to pay for all of that ourselves.”
County Commissioner Bob Davis said some county’s social services manage to help fund their programs. He pointed to the Mental Health Center, which he said brought in 63 percent of its revenue from its patients.
“That’s remarkable and they need to be commended,” he said.
Industrial incentives and recruitment drew comments, too. Janet Haag, who lives near Industrial Park III, asked if the city could require new industries to stay longer than 10 years so they could be assured of going on the tax rolls. Most recruited industries receive a 10-year property tax exemption.
“We have no real ability to make a company stay in town,” Longbine said.
Most do tend to stay anyway, Longbine said, with the recently closed Lenze being a rare exception. But, he added, that the company came to town in part because it was a supplier to Didde. After Didde closed, Lenze had to re-evaluate its options when its 10-year lease on the land expired.
“Since Didde was no longer here, they didn’t find it profitable to maintain a plant in Emporia to supply a plant that is no longer here,” Longbine said.
Zimmerman also noted that the industrial incentives weren’t a freebie. Companies like Lenze have to provide good-paying jobs to get them, he said, and they do.
“Lenze may have left but we got 10 years of good jobs,” he said.
As at previous forums, several people acknowledged that the city had a hard job on its hands. Wishes for luck or little bits of advice were common.
“A lot of it is, you’ve got to respect that you’re spending someone else’s money,” Jaggard said. “Just because someone hands you $100 doesn’t mean you have to spend it all.”