Fiscal Responsibility

By Terry D. Nagel

Why are you paying more now for less service from the city?

At the same time, services are decreasing. Library hours are shorter and clerks won't even stamp the date that your books are due. The City Council may stop sponsoring Art in the Park and the annual Christmas tree-lighting ceremony.

In addition, the City Council has eliminated 25 staff positions. When you call City Hall, you seldom get a live person. If you have a question, you are directed to leave a message on voicemail. There also are five fewer police officers. Are we compromising public safety?

Some of these reductions were inevitable due to the declining city revenues, but others might have been avoided if City Council members hadn't spent money so freely in recent years. One noteworthy example: Burlingame lost more than $300,000 on the golf center that opened in March 2000. It was supposed to make a huge profit, but the only party that made money was the operator, VB Golf. What's more, the city was supposed to put aside $183,000 each year for future maintenance and improvement and it hasn't done so.

Other examples are the $146,000 that the City Council spent on plans for a $29 million teen center that it later abandoned, the $1,580 that council members spent attending the annual county Progress Seminar in Monterey (why couldn't they hold the conference at a Burlingame hotel?) and hundreds of dollars in expenses council members have submitted for attending Sister City functions and other events for organizations not related to the city, such as PARCA, the Shelter Network and Community Gatepath.

Mayor Mike Coffey has shown extreme chutzpah in his expense reports, seeking reimbursement from our tax dollars for donations to charities. In 2002 he billed the city $45 for the Shelter Network's benefit breakfast and another $45 for a Community Gatepath event. In February 2003 he dinged the city $85 for PARCA's "Heart of Parca" benefit.

Although we can't afford to give city employees raises, our appropriations to community groups have increased during the past five years from $37,000 to the current $52,650, and the City Council gave the city manager, who was earning $150,665 during 2002, a hefty bonus.

A total of 28 employees in Burlingame made more than $100,000 during 2002. Yet the cities of San Carlos and Belmont, which have populations similar in size to Burlingame's, only had 10 and 9 employees, respectively, on their 2002 payrolls who earned more than $100,000 a year.

Burlingame is in a financially precarious position. In fact, if the recession continues, the council will need to cut another $2 million from its $70 million budget. If elected, I will reinstate the climate of fiscal conservatism for which Burlingame used to be known.