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The City budget reflects your values...
11/25/12 JD Miller, CPA
The City budget reflects the values of every City employee and every one of your elected City Council members.
These are values of fiscal irresponsibility and screwing future generations of Vallejoans. Current City employees and your elected City Council members don’t want to adopt a budget that will pay for the City Government they have today.
City employees, management working with employee union groups, prepare the City budget each year by dividing up the taxes that Vallejoans pay for public safety, roads, and other City services. In past years, because there wasn’t enough money to pay for everything, City management, working with employee union groups, chose to not pay for pension benefits earned.
Knowingly or unknowingly, current and past City Council members approved these budgets. Each budget reflected the values of every City Council member. Each year, current and past City Council members passed tens of millions of dollars of debt on to future generations to pay for City employees who will be retired, who won’t be providing them with public safety, safe roads, or any other City services.
City employees and Council members chose to burden the next generation with what now is in excess of a QUARTER OF A BILLION DOLLARS for past pension costs that were not paid at the time the City employees earned those pension benefits. This debt will more than double every ten years.
Even worse, by not adopting budgets that pay for current and past City expenses, City employees and your elected Council members have jeopardized the retirement income of current City employees. If future generations don’t pay this debt, there won’t be any money for CalPERS to pay these retired City employees.
Isn’t this a problem that City management, working with employee union groups, should fix, starting today?
Shouldn’t your City Council members advise the City manager and all City employees that they WILL NOT APPROVE THE CITY BUDGET for the next fiscal year if it doesn’t pay for all City expenses, including past pension costs, ensuring that CalPERS will have the money to pay our retired City employees.
Shouldn’t your City Council members advise the City manager and all City employees that they WILL ONLY APPROVE A CITY BUDGET that reflects their values. Critical to these values is that future generations will not be expected to pay for expenses that we should be paying now.
Read article from citywatchla.com: City Hall's Values: Screwing the Next Genertations of Angelinos
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