It’s bite-the-bullet
time for city budget

Council members mull some
unpopular choices as they hunt
for ways to bump up revenue

44,000 more homes getting
automated trash pickup

By Gordon Y.K. Pang
Star-Bulletin

New garbage fees, increased golf fees, more property taxes and higher bus rates.

City Council members will have to choose their poison Thursday and Friday in working sessions for next year's budget.

New Budget Chairwoman Rene Mansho said she expects to have a news conference tomorrow detailing her proposed changes. Council members had until yesterday to submit new proposals to Mansho.

Mayor Jeremy Harris in March submitted a balanced $1.02 billion operating budget that included no increase in property tax revenues over the current year.

But Council opposition to Harris' proposals to impose a garbage fee and increase golf fees mean that savings or revenues must be found elsewhere.

The proposal to charge the island's 174,000 users of the city's garbage hauling service $2.20 a week appears dead. That was expected to bring in $20 million.

"We're trying to balance the budget without garbage fees," Mansho said.

The recently toppled Council leadership, headed by Mufi Hannemann and John Henry Felix, was hoping to partially make up for the garbage fee by raising single-fare bus rides from $1 to $1.50. But officials estimate that plan would bring in only $2.68 million.

Last week, the Council further clouded the picture when it voted to send back to committee a proposal to increase golf green and cart fees for all but senior citizens and those under 18. That plan was to bring an additional $1.8 million, which the Council will need to find somewhere else.

"We're trying to balance the budget without it because of the opposition," Mansho said.

Both Council budget staff and Budget Director Malcolm Tom have been looking for potential cuts.

"I've proposed cuts; they're responding to my cuts," Mansho said.

Harris said he and his budget staff met with Mansho over the weekend to discuss different options. "She has a number of new ideas that the Council is moving forward with," the mayor said.

"Hopefully, we are going to be able to solve the budget problems."

Council Chairman Jon Yoshimura said there is some support left for both golf and bus fees."But I think if we are to have increases, they will have to be moderate increases." He said he doesn't like the idea of balancing the budget on fee increases.

A separate development promises to have a major effect on future operating budgets, although not necessarily the coming year's.

The city apparently has reached an agreement with the United Public Workers over a longtime contract dispute. The agreement clears the way for more than 8,000 workers in the UPW, Hawaii Government Employees Association and other unions to receive raises.

The increases in wages and benefits will be retroactive to 1995 for UPW workers, in1997 for HGEA employees. But the Legislature this year reduced the amount that the city and the other three counties must contribute to the government employees retirement system.

That saving is expected to make up the cost of the increases for the coming year and through fiscal 2001, Budget Director Tom said.

Tom said annual rollover costs from the increased wages and benefits will amount to $15.2 million.

44,000 more homes to get automated trash pickup Star-Bulletin staff An additional 44,000 Oahu households will get automated garbage pickup by the end of June, Mayor Jeremy Harris says. There are 72,000 households under automated pickup, which requires one operator instead of the three used under manual pickup. Harris said adding the 44,000 homes to the ranks of the automated will save the city about $2.2 million annually. It would also mean taking city refuse service to 70 percent automated. Last year, the city distributed 96-gallon containers designed exclusively for the automated trucks to about half of the 44,000 households. But a labor dispute with the United Public Workers, which represents the city's sanitation workers, delayed expansion of the service. The dispute was resolved this month, clearing the way for the expansion. Distribution of the remaining 22,000 containers will occur in the weeks before the expanded automation. Harris said the plan is to add eight more routes, about 16,000 households, to the rolls of the automated next year, taking the city to about 85 percent automation. That would leave about 30,000 non-automated households, primarily in neighborhoods with steep and narrow streets or low-hanging objects.