Hallelujah! D.C. Council members finally landed in the real world, acknowledging that the city will have to reduce the size and cost of government. Even Mayor Adrian M. Fenty has offered a list of potential spending cuts — though not nearly enough. Like other states and local jurisdictions, the District’s revenues have plummeted, and tapping into the rainy day fund to cover the loss won’t be sufficient. Elected officials and managers have to close a projected two-year revenue gap of nearly $700 million.
“It’s 1995 all over again,” said At-Large Councilman David Catania. That’s when the city had a similar shortfall. Then, recalled Council Chairman Pro Tempore Jack Evans, local leaders lacked the spine to make necessary cuts. They chose gimmicks that hid the extent of the city’s financial problems. Congress stepped up. It passed legislation that turned over the District’s finances and management to a five-member control board. No one wants to return to those bad old days.
Chairman Vincent C. Gray said he is “committed to passing a budget that is responsible and will keep the District financially secure. “Tough choices will have to be made, and we will have to choose between many competing priorities. For me, everything is on the table,” Gray continued, adding that he asked council members who also chair committees to cut spending in agencies under their purview between 6 and 10 percent. The test of the council’s resolve will begin tomorrow when activists, nonprofit association managers, business leaders and others converge on the John A. Wilson Building, demanding that their individual priorities become the priorities of the entire city.
The arrival of a hungry and potentially angry community, insisting that their backyard be left pristine, can be frightening, especially for politicians who are up for re-election; opponents already are lining up, intent on picking off At-Large Councilman Phil Mendelson, for example. Still, even he — considered by his record to be one of the most liberal — has said he wants to make cuts in spending, rather than raising taxes. Don’t be confused. When council members and the mayor do their read-our-lips routine, they only mean no increase in property or income taxes. “There will be no sacred cows,” said Catania as he queried City Administrator Neil Albert during a public briefing, insisting on deeper reductions in the city’s health care budget and other programs funded by dedicated revenue streams. “We are all in this together-every single program.” That was the talk Monday.
The council won’t vote until next week. A lot can happen in the interim. Members can catch a case of cold feet. They can develop severe amnesia, forgetting all about those five years when unelected people, beholden to Congress, ran the government. Or they can take the easy way out: Taxing everything in their sights, which, of course, would make a bad situation worse. Stay tuned. Jonetta Rose Barras, host of WPFW’s “D.C. Politics with Jonetta,” can be reached at [email protected].
