D.C. Council Chairman Vince Gray says he’s looking at slicing the city’s spending before examining the possibility of raising taxes and fees to help close the District’s $175 million projected budget gap.
Gray, the presumptive mayor-elect, told The Washington Examiner that he was scheduled to meet with Mayor Adrian Fenty late Thursday to discuss plans for overcoming the shortfall in fiscal 2011’s budget. The fiscal year starts Friday, and Gray already has proposed that the city freeze hiring and promotions immediately, a move only Fenty can make. D.C. Chief Financial Officer Natwar Gandhi told Gray the freeze is a “good idea,” a Gandhi spokesman confirmed.
However, it’s not a long-term fix. The largest chunk of cash missing from the budget comes from a $100 million drop in revenue collection, primarily from drooping collections of sales and income taxes.
“Right now I’m looking at the expenditure side,” Gray told The Examiner. “To be successful we’re going to have to make cuts, but we need to do it responsibly. We’re just starting the process.”
At-large Councilman Kwame Brown, who will likely replace Gray as council chairman in January, agreed.
“There will be cuts. There will be revenue enhancements,” Brown said. “What they are, that’s the question.”
Neither Gray nor Brown were ready to get specific, but Ward 2 Councilman Jack Evans was more clear: Cut human services and education funding.
“If we had done it [in April when the budget was debated], then we probably would have less of a problem today,” he said.
But Ward 6 Councilman Tommy Wells, who heads the council’s Human Services Committee, said the agencies he oversees have already been stripped down and are stretched thin by an influx of needy residents.
According to Wells, the former D.C. General Hospital, which now serves as a homeless shelter, was housing about 35 people this time last year. There are 135 people staying there now.
Wells is considering whether the city should restrict access to services to the most needy and survey human services clients to make sure they’re District residents.
“It’s a means of controlling spending without cutting the amount of funding,” Wells said.
Several councilmembers said it will take more than “gimmicks,” like the Fenty administration’s attempt to charge residents a fee for streetlights outside their homes, to keep the District from spinning into what Evans described as a “death spiral.”
At-large Councilman Michael A. Brown blamed the budget gap on Fenty and D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee, who has gone $30 million over budget.
“We all have a lot of work to do,” Brown said. “The lack of discipline from the Fenty administration and Rhee is unacceptable.”
