Jackson Free Press

In the last two mayoral administrations, Jackson City Council members have griped about not receiving adequate or timely information from the administration. We have found merit in those complaints.

Failure to get information ahead of time to the council, which holds the purse strings for the city, results in council members' inability to make informed financial decisions.

In fact, we heard that very complaint from former Ward 6 Councilman and candidate Tony Yarber earlier this year when he was seeking the mayor's job. He promised to us and to voters that, if elected, he would reverse that trend and provide the city council with ample time to review important information.

Based on his administration's actions in his first budget presentation, Yarber has apparently forgotten those promises.

This week, council members said the fact that they did not get copies of the massive budget book far in enough advance hamstringed them on setting the millage rate, which factors into what the city charges for property taxes for the year. By law, the city cannot change the millage rate after it has been set.

Equally as concerning is the 11th-hour additions to the budget emailed to the council on the same day the body, under state law, was required to submit a budget for the next fiscal year, which commences Oct. 1. Of course, budget proposals are like phone books in that they are often outdated the moment they are printed. Government budgets are moving targets with lots of pieces and sometimes require adjustment, depending on economic conditions.

The Yarber administration's addendum, totaling about $2 million in increases, did not result from a natural disaster that stuck Jackson in recent weeks or the stock market plummeting and, therefore, its timing seems difficult to justify.

In addition to asking to double the amount he wants to spend on lobbyists in Jackson and Washington, D.C., the mayor waited until the last minute to express his opposition to a $120,000 minimum-wage pay increase the city council approved nearly unanimously earlier this month, even as he is asking for $500,000 in pay increases for three city departments in the same budget.

Government transparency notwithstanding, the political wisdom of spending heftily on a major Republican lobbyist while stiffing the city's bottom-most earners —some of the very "everyday people" Yarber said he was campaigning on behalf of this spring—is at best questionable.

Yarber himself seemed to have an "it's easier to say you're sorry than ask for permission" attitude with the council, expressing regrets for not giving the council the information sooner.

Such a mindset is likely to grind the city to a halt when, after a tumultuous year that included the death of Mayor Chokwe Lumumba and young, energetic additions to the council, we should be clicking on all cylinders.

We hope Yarber rights the ship soon.