City Proposes Major Budget Cuts By Spencer Lubitz Jan 14, 2010:
CORPUS CHRISTI - The city of Corpus Christi is forced to make changes to it's current budget because of a shortfall caused by a big drop in sales tax revenues over the past few months. It's estimated that approximately $6.6 million less than originally anticipated will come in through the city sales tax this fiscal year. –snip—
It's a popular misconception that the downturn in sales tax revenue is attributed to a downfall in consumer spending, the city manager's office said. It's actually more directly attributed to a downfall in gas prices across the country.
"Whenever the price of gasoline dropped, we saw a significant drop in our sales tax because so much of our economy is fueled by warehouse transportation, mining industries, things that support the oil and gas industry," Martinez said.
Refineries here pay sales tax on their product and when they sell their product for less money, the city gets less money, leading to changes across the board, including, hiring freezes and layoffs. * –snip--
"About $750,000 of that is associated with the recycling program," Martinez said That program, which was supposed to be expanded by the summer, would instead be eliminated entirely. –snip--
Health and safety services, like the police and fire departments, would not see a reduction in their workforces. Instead, those departments would see cuts in the reductions in the level of fireworks enforcement and purchasing of new police body armor.
KRISTV.com
* Don’t feel too sorry for the city. Among other things, they forced the refineries to pony up $2 million to pay for two gunboats to patrol the bay. Wonder what their budgets would look like if/when the refineries shut down.
