Council wants Three members of the City Council want to create an advisory committee to study city services with an eye toward which ones can be eliminated or reduced to help offset a $160 million budget deficit.
to study services
A panel would identify essential services
and ways to trim the budgetBy Crystal Kua
ckua@starbulletin.com"Because of our really big shortfall, I can see that cuts in services are going to have to be on the table, too, so I just wanted to get some sense of which (services) we should cut if we have to cut any," Council Chairman Gary Okino said.
Okino, Budget Chairwoman Ann Kobayashi and Councilman Romy Cachola have introduced a resolution calling for the creation of the advisory committee on core city government functions.
The resolution, scheduled to be heard during next week's Executive Matters Committee, calls for the mayor to appoint six members and the Council to choose five members. The committee would report its conclusions to the Council and mayor by March 31.
City spokeswoman Carol Costa said Mayor Jeremy Harris and Managing Director Ben Lee were unavailable yesterday for comment on the resolution.
The purpose of the committee would be to determine city government's core functions and recommend "how core government functions can be improved through the elimination, reorganization or the redistribution of the resources of programs deemed noncore programs," according to the resolution.
Okino said, "The assessment could come out that, 'Hey, we're already cut to the bone, and we're only providing the services that people need.' I suspect that's not completely true, but I think this process should kind of look into all of that."
He said that the shortfall is so large that the Council is going to have to look at both raising revenue and reducing services and cost. Okino has previously said that raising property tax rates would likely be necessary to balance the budget.
He said he wants to start the process with a clean slate.
"I think everything should be looked at. Obviously, some are going to be really essential, like waste water and police, fire. But (the committee) needs to take a look at the whole thing," Okino said. "I think we need some kind of assessment as to what should we live with and which services can we live without."
Okino said he wants members of the committee to represent a cross-section of the community and not to be in government.
"What I'm really hoping for is some good indication of what the community wants to see from city government," Okino said. "I think it's good to get the community's input on how we should do this. I would like to see their priorities rather than us, the city or the Council imposing our priorities on the community."
City & County of Honolulu
