Those of us that were at the Oro Valley Council Meeting this evening (March 4) heard the first speaker of the night. It was John Fink, Chief of GRFD who announced that the room was filled to over capacity, and the doors must remain open.
To say the whole OV police department was in attendance would be an exaggeration----although it may have looked that way.
By my count, John Musolf & I spoke against renewing the Utility Tax. The other ten or more speakers, including some police officers spoke in favor of renewing it and all received a large round of applause from the audience.
That was not a surprise as many were (rightfully) concerned about the next item on the agenda----potential job cuts.
When it came time to vote on the tax, only Paula Abbott, KC Carter & Bill Garner stood up against the vast majority of the audience, and voted "No."
Mayor Loomis, Barry Gillaspie, Al Kunisch & Salette Latas were the four that voted to continue with the tax that was due to "sunset" come April 1.
We expected Loomis & Kunisch to vote yes. We thought Gillaspie and/or Latas would join the other three.
It didn't happen!
30 comments:
Way to go Mayor Loomis, Council members Barry Gillaspie, Al Kunisch & Salette Latas. Especially council members Gillaspie and Latas despite being sponsored and supported by the LOVE blog (thanks Art for pointing that out and trying to guilt them in your speech). Looks like they can see the "real deal" and how bad it would be if the town saw it your way
OV Citizen --Too bad you didn't see fit to come over and introduce yourself. Certainly you knew who I was, as I got up to speak against the continuation of the tax.
I guess you feel safer staying incognito.
I was almost trying to guess which speaker you were, but there so many, I kind of lost track.
Not that it's all that important, but the blog did endorse Ms. Latas, but not Mr. Gillaspie, but you've gotten a few facts screwed up in your recent comments.
And finally--- I must apologize for "trying to guilt them" in my speech----whatever that means!
I have no obligation to introduce myself to someone who's rude to the town staff and police chief. Your constant chatter and blathering was even interrupting the town staff, doing their job and hence, why the police chief asked you to move. Being incognito is just fine with me as I represent the silent majority which as you saw last night, was very positively vocal.
I know you supported council member Latas, and not formally Mr. Gillaspie BUT know you do informally support him as your past blogs have stated so very biasly.
Oh, and to comment on your “And finally--- I must apologize for "trying to guilt them" in my speech----whatever that means!”......I’m sorry, you meant to remind them that you lobbied to her support of office and used that, to guilt, sorry, remind her they should listen to you. Fortunately, council member Latas was not intimidated by the possibility of the lack of the LOVE blog support and saw fit to “see the light” knowing things would be much worse had the utility tax failed.
OV Citizen--- I don't want this to deteriorate into a dialog with you and your asinine comments, but stop making false statements about me.
I was rude to the staff? Who and when? That's a lie! As for the police chief---he and I have a cordial relationship, and he did NOT ask me or Bill Adler or Doug McKee to move from our standing position in the back left of the room,(behind staff) necessitated by the overflow crowd of police officers, friends and family that showed up to plead their case.
I won't even comment on your miss use of the English language.
You were asked to move by the cheif of police and you stated something along the lines that you had the right to stand where ever you wanted and there was no law against that so the cheif left yuo alone. Deny it or not Art, it happened and witnessed by many. Enough said on this subject.
Oh, typos or not, a points a point
"I won't even comment on your miss use of the English language." Then don't
That's a damn lie! Ask the chief before you continue with these faslehoods.
Whatever Art...
Will this tax have a expiration date?
Problem with any new tax is that it never goes away and the government never ever ever has enough money!!
Difficult decision for the council and truthfully I don't know how I would have voted.
On the bright side, we don't have a local property tax(yet) and our taxes are reasonable compared to
our home state.
Oh boy, I sure am glad that no one here has my email address.
Is it hot in here or what?
Nombe W.
Art,
Let's just say that all 3 of you were asked to move and didn't, by the chief of police. The lie is the falsehood of you denying this happened. Again, many folks around you including me, witnessed this act so just let it be and let's move on.
Keep babbling with the same crap. We already know who you are and your credibility is ZERO!
Again, whatever Art...like I just made up this random action about you and your cohorts out of the blue. I must have quite the imagination to whip this up out of the blue, for no good reason and to make you look bad. The more you deny said action, the credibility you refer to, sinks not on my end, but yours....next subject please
BTW, if those who think I'm just a crack pot and am making this story up, I challenge you to ask the chief himself, since Art is in denial and won't just admit he and his buddies are wrong and move on...
OV Citizen--- Give it up. Your point is totally pointless and has NOTHING whatsoever to do with the issue.
For you and your associates, I'll state the following.
In a room that was filled with what appeared to be mostly police in uniform & plain clothes, plus family, friends & supporters, there were people that not only couldn't find a seat, but couldn't find a place to stand.
Bill Adler, Doug McKee, both P & Z Commissioners, and I found a spot in the back rear left of the room, behind the table where Chief Danny Sharpe and other OV staff were seated.
The Chief said, you really shouldn't be standing here. Bill replied that there was no other available space. The police chief then said----and I'll quote him: "It's OK if you guys stay here as I know you. I just don't want others to be here if I don't know who they are."
In the overall scheme of things, you are trying to make something out of nothing. Where Bill, Doug & I stood is not the issue.
The issue is that the police were concerned ONLY for the possible loss of 6 or 7 positions.
Not one single police person or any speaker supporting them showed any concern whatsoever for the library workers, the parks & recreation people, the engineering folks,the administrators, or any other town employees or programs as long as they ALL kept their jobs.
For a group that is supposed to look out for the well being of the citizens, they sure did that, as long as the citizens were cops!
That is the issue! The issue is not where I stood in the room.
Thank you Art for clearing that up. Your earlier posts say a bit different but at least we can now move forward. The whole point was that I witnessed (was going to introduce myself) what I did and choose to stay silent since It seemed you all were unapproachable (my opinion) after the exchange. You have valid points in your last post (as I also stated in another LOVE blog comment section, what makes the 6 PD officers any more important than the 27 town employees who may be let go) and some of John’s ideas you posted are also good ones. I think a combination of job cuts, restructuring, stop giving money away to non-essential community services, and the town council not being fed at every session is the way to go. Have a good day.
At the March 4, 2009 Council Meeting I was one of the lone voices that spoke on spending reductions instead of finding a tax revenue approach to budget shortfalls. It looks like our council approves of the Federal Rescue Model approach that thinks we can tax our way to prosperity.
However, the tax increase versus spending reduction argument got drowned out by the army of police officers and their supporters who wanted any form of tax increase that would potentially protect them to a limited degree from potential "public safety" job reductions. "Public safety" was concerned that there was a chance that their "sacred cow" might get gored.
I found it interesting when Councilman Garner asked the financial director Stacy Lemos about the net dollars that would accrue to the general fund by extending the utility tax since the utility tax still had to support the original 18.5 positions from the passage of the utility tax in 2006 which added six sworn officers. Her answer: $175,000 dollars. That revelation got ignored.
The same "public safety" group spoke repeatedly about a possibility of "public safety" reduction in force (item 5) on the agenda even though the town manger's recommendation talked only about other departmental reductions and only hinted at the possibility of "public safety" reduction.
Some facts: the current TOV budget calculation based on population calls for 99 sworn officers and there are 102 sworn officers. There are also an additional 37 police support personnel for a total staffing of 139 in public safety. Lean?
Arizonamoose,
I agree with you that the council and primarily the town manager need to look at other way to cut costs FIRST, before just arbitrarily getting rid of any Town of Oro Valley employees. Maybe this suggestion would help in this trying economic time. Take the 5.9 million for the MOC, put it back in the "rainy day" fund, place the 8 million that the town is required to have for emergencies into 12 month CD's. You could do it in various amounts and at different times (staggered at on month intervals). Use some of the rainy day funds to keep people employed while cutting costs. My bet would be that the interest on the CD's would cover the cost for that year.
OV Citizen,
Thank you for calling Art out. He is a big voice for what I believe is the minority of Oro Valley residents. Keep it up and hopefully more residents will catch on to what is happening here.
Arizonamoose,
Just some corrections, according to the Chief, the police have 7 sworn officers that are on special assignment, so take the 102 and subtract 7, and you have your new, correct total of 95 officers. The 7 on special assignment, the Chief told the council that their salaries are not covered by the town budget.
ConcernedCitizen - Thank you very much for your commentand I completely agree with your statement. We can all do the same and as the silent majority start to speak up, more sense can be made so this blog can be a little more unbias, showing a true sense of what the OV citizens may really feel, instead of such a strong one sided minority.
Concerned Citizen needs to contact Stacy Lemos, TOV Finance Director, to learn how the personnel budget estimates are calculated for various departments including police. Economic Research Associates, a consulting firm, was hired by Oro Valley a couple of years ago at a cost of $60,000 dollars to develop a fiscal impact analysis model called Economic Vitality that the Oro Valley finance staff uses in budget calculations based on population.
The multiplier method used in Economic Vitality concentrates on population to set a budget level. The model assumes that for every increase in population that is a direct increase in, say, the number of police required.
The current budget multiplier for 2008/2009 is 2.3/1000 to calculate sworn officers.
·Population 43,223 Arizona Department of Commerce
·Labor Multiplier 2.3/1000
·Labor Required 99
Current Oro Valley Police Department Staffing:
· Officers: 102 (3 over town budget)
· Police Support: 37 (Strictly overhead)
· Total Police Department Staffing: 139
Chief Sharp is restricted by budget to 99 sworn officers. Chief Sharp is three sworn officers over budget. The Town Council has allowed Chief Sharp to hire 7 more sworn officers outside the town budget to perform duties because other policing agencies pay for them. They can’t be added or subtracted from the police budget calculations.
Quite frankly, in all of this stream, I don't see where Art, the fiscal realities, and so called bias of this blog are relevant to each other. It appears that virtually all of the kettles here are calling the pots black and there very little to be gained or understood by that. Arizonamoose appears to be quite succinct in his presentation of reality without getting into the muddle of personality dynamic. As to Art, this is his blog and as such, right or wrong, he has the right to stir 'it' in any manner HE may opine to be appropriate. Too, I personally am amazed at some of the lack of basic communication and structure skills displayed here, let alone the lack of certain basic components of commonly simple logic; that lack, in itself, doesn't speak well for many of you.
Sorry, should have read: 'and there is very little.....' I left out the word 'is'.
I think I'm a police type of person and I spoke about every employee being part of why we are a community of excellence. I think the layoffs are an excuse to give raises to the elite.
Since when do gov't workers get more money if their work load increases. I know I don't.
To quote staff everyone needs to have skin in the game. To me that means no raises, pay cuts to save the jobs of the Town's employees and the level of service we expect. Cop or Not!
I also spoke about the violence issue that I deal with everyday. Which naturally bridged to the police but my main intent was to stave off any layoffs encourage work furloughs and paycuts accross the board to protects our current levels of service and the families of our employees.
Terry, I know your dedication to law enforcement but I do disagree that "layoffs are an excuse to give raises to the elite". While I agree that there might be some excesses in salaries as well as in the numbers of personnel within the OV staff, I think that an attempt to sort this out is being made in a diligent and hopefully fruitful manner. Understand that a lot of this bloating took place while you were 'assisting' in administrating this community but I think we must all admit that everyone thought that the 'good times' would go on forever; it is obvious that the ride has come to a crunching halt. Everyone, every department, every service is going to have to help in assisting in the recovery of the financial mess we're in and that does include law enforcement agencies.
No Zev, I disagree and why are people afraid of pay decreases. Why are we willing to pay more for less service.
Law enforcement / Public Safety is why gov't was created. Gov't is only required to protect us, but it has taken on many other roles. Those roles cannot be an excuse to make us less safe. That's what happened to Tucson.
Why can't we cut pay and continue to keep our citizens safe. If we are really bloated it is because we strive to be a "Community of Excellence" Show me a community of excellence with a high crime rate and I'll show you a lie.
Terry, I don't think that you and I are really that far apart on this. Read my statement and think of it in depth. Yes, constitutionally, the role of government is to [protect us] but one must analyze how that protection was (and is) supposed to be applied. A community of excellence? There are many components necessary for that, Terry, and much of it is
lacking in order to allow for Oro Valley to be accorded that designation.
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