Steve,

If that is the case, she should have received an email from my adm assistant indicating that I was called out of town and asked if the meeting could be put off until Tuesday or the day before. In regards to the second meeting, I never was notified until the day before the meeting an again was out of town. Why is it that all the meetings appear to be on Fridays. Regardless, during the meeting with Conor and Dr. Adams, I made it perfectly clear that MAJOR reductions in operational funds, i.e. GF & Parks had to be considered. With that said, my absences in the meeting made very little difference when I strongly disagreed with Conor and Doc.

Now, that your fiscal year ending July 31, 2015 posted up cash declines in your operational funds as defined by your controller in the amount of $12,774,000 your mere 1.5 m reduction in the GF is a pimple on the proverbial buffalo’s butt. In regards to Parks, you know and I know that the revenues will be no more than 9.7 m and that is a stretch . .meaning that PF will be out of balance by 600k which is illustrated by the 7/31/15 year end loss in cash of 1.1 m. And, finally, the administration’s claim that you have received “clean” audits would support the posting of fund balances on the Indiana Gateway website which clearly indicates that in the first three years of your boss’ administration overall cash balances have DECLINED by $47,000,000. Generally, I do not include the comprehensive fund approach because many of those funds are fiduciary, i.e. accounts in the 600’s and 800’s but since Mayor Winnecke has floated the totality of those funds as accessible to make PAYROLL which by the way includes the Police and Firefighters pension funds then it is only fitting that an explanation of where did all of that money go over the three year period of time.

This administration is bleeding money and if the administration does not believe this, I suggest enrolling in Basis Principals of Accounting 201 & 202 . And in closing, if Mayor Winnecke thinks that the utility funds should be included as accessible to make payroll, I suggest that he review the provisions within the bond covenant where the utility is prohibited from loaning funds to third parties while bond balances are outstanding.

So, instead of wasting your time and mine, the GF needs an additional reductions of 6.5 m and the Park an additional 600k and I will relent considering the Bernie Maydoff approach concerning increasing the “Tax in Lieu Of” expense to the Utility. While on this subject, why are you hammering the folks in the County by increasing the cost of their Water & Sewer bills in this scheme to increase the GF revenues at their expense???

Should you have any questions, please so advise.

JOHN FRIEND

5th Ward City Councilman

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Councilman Friend,

It is disappointing that you have made your budget vote decision without having attended both of the meetings set up for council leadership to discuss the 2016 budget with Mayor Winnecke. As the budget vote is currently scheduled for Monday, the Administration is certainly willing to sit down and discuss your recommended cuts or additional budget adjustments.

Please let us know if you would like for our office to set up another meeting.

Steve Schaefer
Mayor Winnecke Chief Of Staff

ATTACHED IS AN E-MAIL THAT CITY COUNCILMAN JOHN FRIEND SENT CITY CONTROLLER RUSS LLOYD JR CONCERNING THE ADMINISTRATION BUDGET ADJUSTMENTS BEING LOWER BY $3 MILLION THAT THE MAYORS CHIEF OF STAFF STEVE SCHAEFER MADE REFERENCE TO.

Dear Russ,
Thank you for the attached information. In review of the data, the General Fund adjustment of 1.5 m will not bring the fund into a balanced budget. Based on the actuals of 2014 and projections of 2015 and not withstanding the fact that the PILOT revenue increase costing the Water Utility Ratepayer (80%) is not justifiable . .just a backhanded way of increasing taxes . . is out of balance by 6.5 m. For the year ending July 31, 2015, the administration’s General Fund cash balance declined by 6 m during the period . .Park declined by 1.1 m . . .Downtown TIF declined by 3 m and the remainder of the operational funds declined by 3 m totaling nearly 13 m decline in operational fund cash. In review that the administration is reducing their original budget by 3 m, an additional reduction of 7 m is needed.

The days of phase in are over based on the alarming declines in operational funds as illustrated by the fiscal year ending July 31, 2015 cash balances in operations. Regrettably, last year I was persuaded to support the 4.9 m cuts knowing that the number was 12 m which is supported by the July 31, 2015 fiscal year results. When Mayor Winnecke took over the financial well- being of our City, the total Civil City fund balances were 118 m and at the end of 2014, the total fund balances are 71 m a decline of 47 m. This is verifiable on the Indiana Gateway website. What also give me mega heartburn is the fact that there are 550 cities and towns in Indiana and according to the Department of Local Government Finance (Also obtainable on the Indiana Gateway website) the average cost of municipal operations is $853 per citizen while Evansville is $1,877 per citizen. Out of 550 cities we rank in the lower 8 percentile.

In other words, we have 510 cities operating at lower costs then Evansville. If the average is $853 per citizens and we are at $1,877, a difference of $1,024 times 120,000 people = $12.3 million. Oddly enough, the approximate figure of the overall decline in operational funds for the year ended July 31, 2015.

The Administration is virtually spending every last dime of revenue this city expects to receive and then some. The administration has not allowed for any reserves and unlike some cities, Evansville does not have an ordinance requiring the establishment of any reserve within any particular fund which is unwise and foolish. Unfortunately, I will not be persuaded to support the revised budget and unlike some individuals on Council of which one is a republican and assume he has been in counsel with the administration, are floating the balloon to increase income taxes by 25%, this I will not support as well. If the cost of operating government equaled that of Indianapolis, Ft. Wayne and South Bend and we had implemented a spending plan as strongly suggested by Dan Hadden of Umbaugh in July of 2014, but still fell short maybe just maybe I would entertain the notion of an income tax increase. If tax and spend is the order of the day, count me out.

Russ, I appreciate your service and efforts in this budget process. Of course, my door is open for suggestions.

Respectfully,

John Friend

5th Ward City Councilman

Please take time and vote in today’s “Readers Poll”. Don’t miss reading today’s Feature articles because they are always an interesting read. Please scroll at the bottom of our paper so you can enjoy our creative political cartoons. Copyright 2015 City County Observer. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without our permission.