Mayor McGinn Talks Budget Cuts, Parks

Bitchin' Camaro seems to have finally listened to some of those who told him to get his foot off the gas. Though it's clear he's still unrepentent about how royally he's wrecked the town in his initial hoopla, and it's equally clear that he's still stuck on the “rudderless” setting that the Times accused him of last week. Wot's it gonna be next?

Gallagher was integral in the discussions of what went into the Parks levy in 2008. Why didn't he speak up then?

“I love parks and I care about parks, but we have to take care of people in need in this city.” Yes.

“We have to keep the streets paved.” Not really. I definately put people over parks, but cars over parks? There are reasonable arguments for this but it's certainly not a given.

Our roads are pothole-riddled, but we can stay in “pothole ranger” mode for a few years until we recover without any major reprocussions. But stop watering your plants and when we recover we'll have to buy new plants. That seems like the larger waste of resources.

Mike McGinn was the lead person championing the Parks Levy even though it included no source of funds to pay for operating and maintaining the new parks and facilities. Mike McGinn was the lead person at the Sierra Club that opposed the Roads and Transit levy which would have funded a replacement bridge to South Park. Now we have a parks system in danger of collapse due to lack of operations funds and the residents of South Park will be cut off when the bridge is closed permanently in June. But this is all the fault of others? It's called responsibility Mr. Mayor. You lead us into these messes, it's now your job to lead us out.

That's right: we shouldn't purchase parks land unless we can guarantee that the second great depression won't hurt our ability keep them perfectly maintained. Anyone who ever wanted to add more parks was irresponsible.

Wait…with that mindset, the City would be condos from border to border. Better to make smart investments when we can, and if we have to mow the lawn less in the bad times, so be it.

fount – do you put keeping restrooms open and clean along with emptying the garbage cans under the umbrella of perfectly maintaining parks ? That is what will be the first things to go – this is way more than about mowing the lawn regularly.

Mike – I would be careful about throwing rocks at the City Council over the budget. See, as the executive you will propose a budget based on Glenn's revenue forecast. Then when the forecast turns out to be wrong you will have put yourself in the uncomfortable position of a hypocrite. Unless that is how you live your life then you will have no problem with it.

Our parks have plants that need to be watered? How stupid is that, if true? Wouldn't you think they would use native vegetation that could thrive in our climate without needing watering?

Think bikes. Bikes need much more perfect roads than cars do.

And Grover is mostly right about plants. We do need to water some new trees and such. Of course, planting in early Spring would help, but too many parks people are at conferences. -;)

We don't have money for parks, roads or police, but we can afffor billions for light rail lines to W. Seattle and Ballard? LOL What a moron our mayor is.

We already have RapidRide bus routes planned and paid for which will be going to W. Seattle and Ballard in a few years, Mike.

If there is extra money lying around to build little toy trains in this city, there must be money for 20 more cops, maintaining our parks, and keeping the roads paved. Right?

The issue was widely discussed at the time. We didn't have a good source of funding for the existing parks, much less the new ones.

potholes are a lot worse on bikes then they are on cars.

I don't think I'd say it was “widely discussed at the time.” If it was, we wouldn't be in this predicament.

Instead, when a few of us openly questioned City Councilmembers in various public venues, we were repeatedly told that O&M should come from the general fund and not a levy — even when we predicted the coming budget crisis. And they assured us they would plan for it.

Ooops. Sorry! *SHRUG* are not really acceptable answers now.

And let's be clear about what's coming here in regards to Parks…

It's not just that trash will not get emptied and restrooms will be locked. Starting THIS SUMMER they're proposing to close wading pools, public pools, close one or more community centers, reduce hours and programming and lay off staff.

You think youth violence is bad now, wait until we lose the positive adult influence in a couple thousand teens' lives here.

But, hey, I'm glad everyone pulled together to raise money to keep the fireworks going this year.

He is making a giant mistake bitching about the legislative branch (sorry new kids on the block, meathead is about to sandbag himself).

$500,000 in two days was an amazing accomplishment, and I think cities really should have fireworks displays.

But we all know there's more money there. Why don't Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks or others pay for more stuff around here? And if they offered — like, say, the Starbucks Community Pool, or Microsoft Central Park — would we accept it?

You're off-target here, Stickler. The South Park bridge is in King County, not Seattle. King County DOT knocked itself out to get federal stimulus money for the bridge, but the feds said no. The feds DID provide stimulus $$ for a generous chunk of Seattle's $300,000,000 makeover of 6 blocks of Mercer Street.

I forget – who owns the South Park Bridge? King County.

What jurisdiction does the bridge sit in – both sides? King County.

Who has failed to secure funding to replace the supposedly vital piece of regional infrastructure? King County.

Is this the Mayor's responsibility? Nope.

I assume we need to water new plants for the first few years, though I don't know for sure. I'm just trying to picture what the big O&M costs are. Mowing the lawns? Without that we'll ruin grass quickly. Trash removal? That's arguably more important than paving streets.

Good point about bikes. But are we only paving bike routes? Or can we put off a few bike-inappropriate roads for a few years in exchange for our parks?

Whenever they threaten to close parks (not rec facilities, but parks) I assume it's a bluff. Plenty of people would be willing to mow grass, water plants and empty trash to keep them open.
The bathrooms…another matter. Put locks on them if need be.

repairing potholes and damaged roads BEFORE they get worse saves a lot of money in the long-term. if potholes are left in the road, it changes from the cost to fix the pothole to the cost to rip out that pavement and fix the whole road. i'd look to a post at the infrastructurist for more information: http://www.infrastructurist.com/2010/04/28/whos…

Depopulation of the metro areas has begun. Parks will turn into wetlands and meadows. No need to tax.

I don't suggest dropping our pothole program. Just putting off paving the roads.

It would be interested for Publicola to go through their questions to McGinn from the Parks Levy years ago to find out his answers on the lack of ongoing funding and match that up with today.

I guess he is finally taking the cue that he should be wearing a tie to work. I guess that's a start. Low expectations…. “at least he wore a tie to work today.”

It's not like Parks was singled out for capital budgets that dwarfed operating budgets. We also had levies that built new community centers and libraries whose operations funding was premised upon the presumption that the economy would keep going up and up. Now they're experiencing cuts too. You can take a glass half empty or half full approach to it. We have a new civic architecture that is either a kind of hallow facade, or whose expansion provides a backdoor way to demand new funding for government services. Problem is that funding is likely to come more through private funding– through fees and organized “friends” of various civic institutions– than from tax reform that would get the wealthy to ante up for the high quality of life they benefit from in Seattle.

To the commentators:

When you consider the Seattle Parks Department and how poorly it was managed under Gallagher you should take a look at the “Northlake Park” on NE Northlake way at about 8th NE.

It cost $204,304 from the Parks Levy.

It is a concrete sidewalk 100 feet long and about 10 feet wide. It has a 4-foot high chain link fence and two small sapplings planted in a opening in the sidewalk and some ground cover. Its is about what most houses have on the street frontage.

Based on the measured materials (quantities) and current in-place costs it should have cost about $16,831. (Excluding design and construction inspection costs.)

The State Auditor (director of special investigations) was not impressed with the Parks staff on that one. For example they found that they had used cast iron pipe (CIP) instead of PVC for the drainage system. Also, the sidewalk, per city standards should be 3.5 inches of concrete on compacted subgrade. Parks staff used 5 inches with 2 layers of re-bar.

It was over designed with no attempt at cost savings.

And that is why they have no money.

Take the time to check it out and then you will see what's wrong. It is a fine example. Even the defense Department couldn't match that one.

t state slIt should have cost .

I question how the politicians are handling the Parks & Recs funding shortfall. At Queen Anne Community Center users are up-in-arms about possible closure. As reported on the Magnolia blog, the closure angst is focused on Discovery Park. I'm sure it's the same thing in other neighborhoods across the city. The 'up-in-arms' folks are headed to the public forums to pitch keeping their neighborhood park/community center open. Is this any way to metphorically run a railroad?

Meanwhile, the library is facing the same level of cuts. There it's all behind the scenes, and if the past cuts are any indication, the results will be based on something concrete, like usage. At the same time, the library has had a hiring freeze in effect for some time, and as part of the current funding problem, has made every effort not to layoff staff.

Conversely, the Park and Rec rumor mill includes significant staff cuts.

So Publicola can someone smarter than I am explain why someone somewhere in the city can't apply the same rules as the library does which would be much healthier for all participants–not too mention all the hard feelings, finger-pointing, and disgust at elected officials who are punting on the Parks and Rec shortfall?

http://www.seattle.gov/financedepartment/10adop…

I thought I'd post the budget in case any intrepid reporter, er, blogger, and readers care to check it out. Its a surprisingly reader-friendly document. Read pages 19-25: their analysis of the global conditions are spot on…

Parks and Recreation begins on page 87, through page 117. Over 1,000 FTEs, $130 million annual budget (up 5% from 2008). Revenues are projected to be basically stable in 2010 relative to 2008 and 2009. Check out “Recreation Facilities and Programs Budget Control Level” on page 106. The funding for O&M looks to have increased substantially between 2008 and 2009. The growth between 2009 and 2010 is largely due to departmental reorganization. No substantial cuts that I can see.

In hindsight, he says, “it would have been wise to include operations and maintenance in the levy.”

In hindsight, I wish I didn't vote for this guy.

Cute, but not helpful.

You folks all missed the code words in the pothole talk. It doesn't have anything to do with bikes. Budget cuts will prioritize basic services. Those are the marching orders for department heads. It still boils down to judgment calls. The scary part is that we don't trust the judgment of the people making the decisions.