Horrible News Out of Austin

A small plane has crashed into an office building that reportedly houses an IRS office in Northwest Austin. I drove by this office complex every day when I lived there and I'm hoping and praying for everyone in that office building.

Stimulating

Yesterday, U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis was in Phoenix touting the effectiveness of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), more commonly known as the "Stimulus" program. Perhaps the visit was a preemptive effort to get in front of the news that the City of Phoenix would not receive additional ARRA funding for the PHX Sky Train project that Mayor Phil Gordon has long been touting.

The PHX Sky Train is a people mover that, once completed in 2013 will connect all of the terminals at Sky Harbor Airport with the light rail and the parking lots. According to Scott Wong's Arizona Republic article, Phoenix will instead finance the project with "airline passenger fees, airport bonds and other revenue."

Perhaps adding insult to injury, Arizona "rival" Tucson was awarded $63 million yesterday for a transit project of its own. Mayor Gordon was quoted as saying, "Anyone who knows me knows I don't accept no for an answer." It will be interesting to see what Mayor Gordon is able to accomplish before he leaves office, either due to term limits or a potential bid for the US Congress.

It’s All About the Benjamin’s

I'm now of the assumption that this will be a looming topic throughout the semester: money, money, money. It seems that virtually every meeting I attend eventually circles back to the topic. The State of Arizona is broke, the City of Phoenix is broke, virtually every other city in the Valley is broke and the outlook for the near future does not offer much hope. And when there is a lack of resources the infighting begins, though typically it is behind closed doors and not in public.

And now cuts are coming. According to this article by Scott Wong of the Arizona Republic, "The City Manager's Office would face nearly a 30 percent cut, losing about $720,000. Meanwhile, Mayor Phil Gordon's office would be slashed by 25 percent, or $522,000, while offices for the eight other council members would see a 24 percent cut, totaling more than $1 million." And the most controversial cuts are those to public safety (police and fire).

Citing Scott Wong again, the proposed cuts to police and fire would be, "The Police Department would lose about 353 sworn positions, from patrol officers to assistant chiefs. The Fire Department would cut 144 sworn jobs." The City of Phoenix has never laid off sworn police or fire employees. It is in this context that the city proposed, and passed a 2% food tax on Phoenicians to help mitigate the budget shortfall and to help keep these positions.

One thing that is certain though is this will not be the last post from me regarding budgetary issues and their fallouts.