Jackson Free Press

The Jackson City Council is willing to approve a budget revision next week filling a $4 million budget shortfall, Ward 2 Councilman Chokwe Lumumba believes.

"This revision appears necessary," Lumumba said. "I don't think the council will oppose this revision at this time."

Halfway into the budget year, Jackson Mayor Harvey Johnson Jr. pitched a proposal to the council last week to shift some city funds from savings to cover shortfalls.

"The total amount of revisions is a little over $4 million, and most of that, about $3.5 million, will be coming out of our applied-fund balance. The remainder, $600,000 or so, will be coming out of savings that we anticipate," Johnson told the Jackson Free Press.

The city's "applied-fund balance" is a reserve fund that does not have a council-imposed restriction on its minimum amount. It is composed of savings created in some city departments, many due to budgeted employee positions that remain unfilled.

Johnson said one of the biggest drains on the budget is the city's arbitration conclusion with JATRAN bus workers. That arbitration resulted in $984,000 in back pay and vacation costs paid to unionized bus drivers and mechanics, and an annual increase of about $550,000 for those employees in the 2011 budget.

In addition to an extra $1 million that Johnson expects JATRAN employees to need this year, rising gas prices are forcing the city to add another $200,000 to the bus budget.

The city also must add $1.2 million to its tort-claims fund. State law requires Jackson to have about $2.5 million in the fund, according to the mayor, who said the city only has "about $2 million" in the fund now. Johnson said the city needs to add an additional $700,000 in anticipation of future claims.

Lumumba said he felt the city could preserve more money in its tort claims fund if it changed its habit of appealing so many unfavorable court opinions to higher courts.

"We need to take a better look at settling some of these cases earlier on. I know of a couple of cases that became very expensive because we continued to pursue the things and appealed in court and the court ruled against us. We have to look at that (behavior) very closely," Lumumba said.

Police overtime also remained an issue, having run up $1.1 million in costs.

"We've had a lot of (police) visibility, and we're still not fully staffed for the officers that we're budgeted for," Johnson said.

"Plus, even those that we have on staff are not always out patrolling. They may be on medical leave or on military leave or be on desk duty."

The city remains 40 officers short of its 500 budgeted officers, despite the graduation of recruits earlier this year.

The city also needs to fill a $275,000 shortfall in its municipal early-childhood-centers budget, match a $40,000 AmeriCorps grant, and repay $100,000 to its "grass-cutting" budget, because it borrowed that amount to fund needed demolition work.

The Council budget committee approved the proposal last week, and will put the issue before the regular Council for a vote May 31.