Gawd people, keep Kirsten and Peter and remove the other spenders from office, don't let Rojas stay on either, once he is retired he is gone ! So, let me understand this, we have a balanced budget with pay increases ? If we didn't have pay increases could we have a small surplus ? The word surplus has been removed from everyone's vocabulary because no one will see one in this decade..Maybe in Latin America, when things didn't go well, they removed (revolted)
against the ruling parties !! Dysfunctionality at it's best, even Atherton is getting it's act together. What a WOW

To call this a balanced budget is a joke.
What about the unfunded liabilities?
What about the use of long term reserves for current expenses ?

The budget may be technically balanced, but after a decade plus of cut backs on top of cut backs - maintenance, infrastructure, parks, even library hours - we are hardly meeting basic needs with this budget. City services are being swamped by employee costs that keep rising even when we cut positions and freeze salaries, thanks to the "interest only" style of funding pensions. We cannot go on with this kind of "balanced " budget, the math just doesn't work. There's been progress on costs but there is a lot of work still to do - do we have the leadership to do it?

"do we have the leadership to do it?"

Clearly we don't or this pay raise never would have been put through. Only Keith and Ohtaki seem to have a grasp of the problem. Unfortunately, they don't constitute a majority on the council.

It's obvious that despite their beliefs that 3 council members didn't hear the voice of the people last election. What about tough economic times don't they get? Sure we all want a raise. It's evident now that government employees have some of the best paying jobs. Wake up council and represent the citizens!

The Council needs to understand that the residents are frustrated with the "Status Quo" governance we've received from them. Their complete ignorance of the budget and spending are exasperating, in light of the current economic conditions they cut services without cutting back staff, and continue to spend money (as my father used to say) "like drunk sailors on shore leave"

Mayor Clines comment that $15,000 was insignificant in light of the rest of the budget is naive and insulting. That $15,000 becomes an additional $400,000 in pension payments over the 32+ years CalPERS says our commanders will live beyond retirement. Rich.....do the MATH. That is REAL money you just gave away.

As I've stated earlier, the November 2012 elections can't come soon enough to rid ourselves of Kelly and Andy, talk about out of touch. They need to go.

Roy

Actually, the real shame is their arrogance and the amount of damage they will do before the next election.

It would be nice if these elected official REPRESENTED their constituents.

Let's not forget that this follows a 30% raise two years ago:

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