SANTA MONICA : Economic Upturn Allows Breathing Room in ‘94-95 Budget

The Santa Monica City Council has approved a $200.5-million budget that signals a slight upswing of the local economy after several years of recession.

“This is a coming-back budget,” Councilman Paul Rosenstein said after Tuesday’s unanimous vote. “We’re coming back from several years of hard times to restore the city to what it should be.”

The 1994-95 budget has no major cuts or general tax increases because revenues--thanks to the beginnings of economic recovery--are expected to be relatively strong. The budget will, however, increase fees on city services ranging from pawnbroker license renewals to the preparation of traffic accident reports. Accident reports will now cost $17, up from $10. These increases are expected to bring in $1 million in additional annual revenue.

City workers will receive a cost-of-living pay increase next year, after a year in which their salaries were frozen to save money amid the recession.

Unlike some contentious budget sessions in the past, the five-hour hearing went smoothly.

Other budget features:

* An appropriation of $5,800 to the domestic abuse program at Westside Legal Services, which was funded for only three months because of its financial woes. (It owes the IRS about $90,000.)

* Noting there has been an increase in calls to domestic violence programs since the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Lyle Goldman, the council set aside another $50,000 for such services without specifying which organizations will get the money.

* An appropriation of $560,000 to allow the Police Department to beef up patrols in Palisades Park and downtown.

* $360,000 for a new homeless shelter, with some of the money coming from cuts in emergency services for the homeless.

* $60,000 to allow the library to purchase CD-ROM computer equipment.

The council had expressed a willingness to appropriate more money to extend library hours. But City Librarian Wini Allard told the council she did not want the hours extended this year because it would interfere with a library remodeling program.

The main library is not open Sunday evenings, and the branch libraries are closed Fridays and Sundays.