Evanston aldermen Monday night gave final approval to a $335 million budget for2018 that calls for a spending nearly nine percent more than this year.
The increase is largely a result of planned spending on a new Robert Crown Center and a major renovation project at the main library.
The budget also calls for the elimination of about two dozen city worker jobs and various other cutbacks to trim more than $4 million from general fund spending and imposes an array of new taxes and fee hikes.
The budget manages to limit the percentage increase in property taxes to fund city services other than the public library to 1.45 percent, while the library fund levy is to increase more than 5 percent.
The final adopted budget largely follows the plan laid out by City Manager Wally Bobkiewicz back in October, although alderman did make a variety of modifications — ranging from boosting staffing for victim services programs that were moved from the police to the health department to a last minute increase of $8,000 for discretionary spending by the city clerk.
City Budget
I’m not sure how it’s ALWAYS okay to spend more (in this case a city budget) but NEVER a good idea to spend LESS. And tax less.
Budget
You made a wonderful statement……it may be because the people making these decisions are self-serving, and have enormous salaries. They are far removed from the masses of the hard working, lower-paid …and unemployed. Why would they care?
Re: Budget
Dont forget the subsidized housing benefit and the subsidized automobile benefit the City Manager received when he accepted the lucrative position. Cha-ching!
benefits
Yes, I’m sure he was in dire need of that..poor guy wasn’t masking enough money.
Fewer to pay the bills
Several newspapers in the last few days have pointed out the large number of people leaving Illinois for other states and the large drain on Illinois economy and budget/debt. Other states, including contigious states have not felt the drain. As people and jobs leave, there will be fewer to pay the bills and pensions and so blind-to-the-facts governmentt will raise taxes to fund spending, pension and taking care of the needy. You know where that cycle ends [no it never ends].
Evanston government does not seem to care—they will just keep spending on anything in sight—and raise taxes. Pretty soon they will run out of other people’s money to spend.
Bad decisions over and over again
“Insanity Is Doing the Same Thing Over and Over Again and Expecting Different Results” attributed to Albert Einstein
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Evanston voters follow this pattern—electing the same homogenous [Democrat] slate every election who continue to bleed taxpayers and make the same bad mistakes— theaters for possible group, branch libraries instead of one good library, special deals for arts groups, bad deals like with Trader Joes, regulations, delays in decisions and taxes that discourage businesses, hiring administrators that are clearly not up to the job and then paying them far above what even a good one shoulo make, dumb decisions by the schools instead of spending resources on real education—and well the list could go on and on. If it just hurt the dumb voters, we could say they deserve it, but it effects us all.
Well, what can you expect?
Well how do you expect them to elect a Republican when they get scarred by Trumps, Moores and Bannons every day?