Brooklyn Center is Exhibit A in aid cuts debate - Star Tribune
June 11, 2009
Mike Kaszuba, Star Tribune, June 10, 2009. Gov. Tim Pawlenty has not singled out Brooklyn Center when he wonders aloud whether cities are doing enough to cut spending. But in some ways, the first-ring Minneapolis suburb could serve as a prime exhibit of what the Republican governor said is a major problem as he considers another round of cuts in aid to cities to help balance the state budget through his controversial use of the "unallotment" process.
Too many cities, the governor has frequently pointed out, have large, untapped reserve funds and do not seem inclined to freeze salaries even as they complain about the effects of state aid cuts. When cities are asked how much they can cut, Pawlenty said, "the answer better not be zero." Even after a $540,000 cut in state aid in December, Brooklyn Center had by April approved wage increases for its police unions, city manager and City Council. Even after those aid cuts, the city had a $7.7 million cash flow reserve, roughly equal to half of its total annual general fund budget.
Yet gauging how much the city, a suburb with a dying regional shopping mall and an up-and-down crime problem, can cut before it hurts may be harder than the governor and others contend. Last year Brooklyn Center's budget reserve rose as high as $8 million at one point and dipped to $2 million at another, rising and falling based on property tax payments that flow to the city twice a year. State Auditor Rebecca Otto, a DFLer, said Pawlenty has oversimplified the purpose of a city's reserve fund, used for emergencies, to pay bills and to keep a city from having to borrow money. "I am frustrated with the rhetoric," said Otto, adding that Brooklyn Center's budget reserve "sounds reasonable, frankly."
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