Many city programs, services and employees face potential funding cuts as the city of Phoenix works to create the 2014-15 budget to combat the nearly $38-million deficit. Conflicting viewpoints are being voiced regarding where the sixth largest city in the United States should spend its money, especially when it comes to emergency services.
“It’s a difficult situation where we’ve got to weigh all the different needs within the city,” Councilman Bill Gates said. “We have a budget deficit that was unexpected. We need to address that problem.”
Councilman Sal DiCiccio issued a statement and formal letter to Phoenix City Manager Ed Zuercher that said, “I want to make one point abundantly clear — I will not support any cuts to our police officers’ pay, compensation or positions.”
While DiCiccio declined to speak about his call to action after several phone calls, his chief of staff, Chris Shipley, offered his understanding of the budget.
“Everything’s really on the chopping block at this point in time,” Shipley said.
The deficit, Shipley said, stands at $37.7 million. To make up that deficit, the city will more than likely defer costs that can be pushed back, which will account for about $2 million. From there, six or seven million dollars in costs could be cut by eliminating vacant civilian positions. That leaves approximately $29 million in costs that need to be cut elsewhere, he said.
“I’m not particularly fond of it,” Shipley said. “$29 million in cuts to services is no way to balance the budget. I think ultimately there will be cuts that the public will have to endure, but I think that can be very small in scale. I think $29 million is entirely too much.”
Zuercher created the trial budget late last month and presented it to the City Council and the public.
After the trial budget was presented, members of the public were allowed to speak about particular concerns with the budget. Council members were also allowed to raise questions and comments.
“Now, over the next few weeks, we encourage everyone to attend the budget hearings that are going to be held around the city where people have the opportunity to dig into the budget, learn more about it and speak about what they think our top priorities should be as a city,” Gates said.
Councilman Michael Nowakowski, who serves downtown, has also served on the police chief’s advisory board for more than 16 years. Nowakowski was among the first to sign DiCiccio’s call for an end to police cuts.
“One of the things we hear before we go to these community meetings is that we need more police officers and more neighborhood policing,” Nowakowski said. “That was the No. 1 message that I heard in all of my public hearings.”
The downtown area has lately witnessed crimes that hit close to home. Four ASU students were robbed at gunpoint close to the campus and a carjacking ended in a temporary light rail closure by CityScape.
“We need to make sure that those individuals out there know that there are police officers,” Nowakowski said. “I believe that if they see a strong force of police, that it’s a deterrent to criminals, especially people that are going to be stealing bikes, pointing guns to people and stuff like that.”
While the focus has intensified on the police and fire departments as talks of next year’s budget begin, Gates said they’re always a priority.
“If people don’t feel safe in their homes, if they don’t feel like when there’s an emergency that they will be taken care of and protected, then everything else sort of goes out the window,” Gates said. “Because of that they have such a large amount of the city’s budget and they deserve the attention that they get.”
Nowakowski said the growing need for more police enforcement is partly due to ASU’s Downtown campus.
“Just look at the student population in downtown compared to five years ago,” Nowakowski said. “It’s changed drastically. I think we need to find ways of hiring more police officers and especially to have more police officers on the streets.”
That attention has also been attracted by tragic injuries and losses of officers in both the police and fire departments in recent years.
“As we’ve seen very tragically in recent weeks, you could get killed doing this job,” Waring said. “Bullets are flying, bad things are happening, and this is our front line of defense.”
In his statement, DiCiccio highlighted the same concern.
“Phoenix PD is our first, and sometimes only, line of defense. They did not create the budget fiasco — the politicians, the mayor and council did,” DiCiccio’s statement said.
Gates said the statement was a good one.
“I think it’s a great reflection of his support for the police that I think all of us share,” Gates said. “I think that it’s very important that we do everything to show that we’re there, right in line with them.”
In the coming weeks, the budget will be refined, based on testimony from members of the community who will highlight key aspects of the city’s spending.
Until the budget is finalized, it is unclear how much the police and fire departments will see.
The needs of the police and fire department intersect with the needs of the entire city, Nowakowski said.
“A lot of people talk about having an active downtown,” Nowakowski said. “If you have an active downtown, that means more events, more people, more street closures, and that means we need to have more security, more police officers. These are growing pains that we’re going through in downtown Phoenix, but I think they’re good growing pains. As the student population grows, so should the police enforcement of downtown.”
Editor’s note: The four ASU students in the robbery mentioned in this article are also Downtown Devil staff members.
Contact the reporter at Alexandra.Long@asu.edu.
