Pasadena Council to Weigh Scaled-Back Budget Proposal

Pasadena’s city manager Monday will present a general fund budget for the coming fiscal year to the City Council that calls for $2.2 million less in spending.

The proposed budget eliminates some unfilled jobs and transfers some employees to understaffed departments, absorbs the Parks and Recreation Department into other divisions and combines the city’s Affirmative Action Commission with the Human Relations Commission.

“Most of the reductions are internal and the public won’t see any difference in service,” City Manager Phil Hawkey said. The council must approve the budget by June 30.

Hawkey said Wednesday that, factoring in inflation, his proposed $112.3-million general fund budget for the 1998 fiscal year beginning July 1 will actually be $5 million less than this year’s budget.

He said the spending plan calls for the city to eliminate 33 positions, eight of which have been filled. None of the eight employees would be fired, and would be offered jobs in other departments where 60 openings exist, Hawkey said. However, he said, the new jobs may be for lower pay.

As part of a separate downsizing, another 18 employees of the city’s Department of Water and Power will be offered jobs in other city departments, he said.

Hawkey is proposing breaking up the Parks and Recreation Department, with recreation services becoming part of the Human Services Department that would be renamed Human Services, Recreation and Neighborhoods. Park maintenance would become part of the Public Works Department, Hawkey said.

Hawkey said the budget would expand after-school recreation programs for children to three moresites, but will for the first time ask parents to donate money to the program.

The move to combine the Affirmative Action Commission with the Human Relations Commission is likely to generate controversy given the city’s opposition in court to Proposition 209, a state initiative eliminating affirmative action.