Westside Budget Roundup : CULVER CITY : New Budget Turns Out Some Lights, Cuts Jobs

Streets will be dimmer at night, parks browner, and one fire chief will be a bit more nervous as Culver City begins a new fiscal year Monday.

To close what would have been a $4.8-million gap between revenues and expenses for fiscal 1991-92, the city will cut back on personnel and services as basic as lighting the streets. More than 600 street lights--about one in three on the city’s major thoroughfares--will be disconnected, saving the city $102,000, according to Bob Norquist, budget and finance specialist in the city’s administrative office.

Nineteen of the city’s 500 jobs were eliminated, including two firefighter positions. Fire Chief Michael Olson said he had not decided which of the city’s three fire stations would be docked the firefighter slots.

“Any time you have less people,” Olson said, “it takes more time to get the job done. And with the nature of this business, that can be very serious.”

With one less firefighter, “it will take a little longer to get multiple hoses on the fire. It will take longer to do search and rescue. . . . But we’ll work hard to make do with what we have.”

Chief of Police Ted Cooke, who will lose a patrol officer and a detective, was more optimistic. “I don’t think it’s going to be an impact that anyone in the community will notice. . . . There might be a slight impact on response time,” he said, “but we have one of the best response times in the county anyway.”

A fire dispatcher position was eliminated from the morning shift, traditionally the slowest time for fire emergencies, leaving one dispatcher to field police and fire emergency calls from 1 to 7 a.m., Cooke said.

The budget approved by the City Council Monday night called for $42.2 million in general fund expenditures, up 3.3% from the current year. In addition to the cutbacks, it includes one substantial tax increase: The city tax on real estate sales will rise from $2.20 to $4.50 per $1,000, and is expected to bring in an additional $300,000 to $500,000 for the city.

Fees for city services such as building planning and engineering also will increase, as will fees for renting rooms in Veterans Memorial Hall and for commercial filming within city limits.

The $4.8-million budget gap is primarily a product of the recession, Norquist said. Slow retail sales have generated less sales-tax revenue, and the sluggish housing market has caused a sharp drop in anticipated revenue from the real estate-transfer tax. Meanwhile, the cost of providing services has increased, and new services such as recycling have been taken up.

Budget shortfalls are projected for at least the next three years, Norquist said. By then, the city expects a substantial boost in income from Marina Place, a proposed regional shopping mall, and from Columbia Studios, which is planning an extensive development of its property in the city.

City employees, whose salaries and benefits account for 78% of the projected general fund expenditures, will absorb the brunt of the 1991-92 cutbacks. Many of the eliminated jobs were already vacant, however, because of a hiring freeze imposed in February as the extent of the recession began to become apparent.

A round of raises scheduled for certain city employees this year, designed to bring them up to par with comparable cities, has been postponed, saving $90,000. Cost-of-living adjustments will also be forgone, saving $136,000. An additional $725,000 will be saved by leaving positions vacant longer and hiring replacement workers at a lower salary.

Also cut back were clerks, secretaries and supplies, ranging from bottled drinking water for workers to recreation program equipment.

Eliminated maintenance positions included tree trimmers, a road laborer, a janitor, a painter and a park worker. The city will save $5,500 by contracting out for maintenance services in the Veterans Hall.

In response to the drought, the city’s 18 parks will be watered less, saving $27,000, Norquist said.

“(The parks) may be a little less green than what we’re used to,” he said. “But we’re certainly not going to let them die.”

Although City Council members voted unanimously to adopt the budget, several expressed concern about decisions to save $550,000 by delaying payments to the city’s vehicle fund, and to use other one-time funds--such as developer fees from the Columbia Studios project--to help close the $4.8-million budget gap.

“I don’t want to give anyone the impression that this is a balanced budget,” said Councilman Steven Gourley. “We used $1.2 million of one-time funds that will not be available next year.”