Kansas City budget proposal has big spending boost for police and fire

You might say this is the year that public safety costs consumed the Kansas City budget.

City Manager Troy Schulte and Mayor Sly James released their budget proposal Thursday, calling for a $19 million increase in public safety spending, or 4.6 percent more than the current year. Public safety — police, fire, ambulance and Municipal Court — accounts for three-fourths of the general fund operating budget.

“Public safety is fundamental to our city’s success, and a priority of our citizens,” James said.

But he added that these kinds of public safety cost increases are unsustainable, and said the city needs to get a handle on those expenses so it can fulfill all its other functions.

“This is a big city with a lot of needs,” he said.

The budget submission comes at a time when the city is struggling to reduce high homicide numbers, which reached 128 in 2016, up from 111 in 2015 and 82 in 2014.

Most of the increase for police and fire comes in the form of wage and benefit increases negotiated with management. The increase in public safety spending exceeds projected revenue growth, which means the city has to cut other services and functions. The budget would cut about 15 non-public-safety positions, which are vacant, administrative positions like law and human resources.

The city also has a hiring freeze on all non-public safety departments.

“We’ve squeezed back the organization,” Schulte said.

The city manager noted that public safety consumes a high share, 76 percent, of Kansas City’s general fund. That’s up from a 70-percent share of the budget when James first took office in 2011. In most of Kansas City’s peer cities, public safety costs take up about 66 percent of the general fund, Schulte said.

Non-public-safety services like parks programs, trash collection, neighborhood services, leaf and brush and bulky item collection will remain stable but won’t increase.

A $10 million, two-year dangerous building demolition program that began in the current fiscal year continues in the new budget plan, as city officials try to eliminate a backlog of ugly abandoned houses.

The City Council will hold public hearings before adopting the budget March 23. It takes effect May 1 and runs through April 30, 2018.

The total budget is $1.59 billion, up 4 percent from this year’s total. Of that, $1 billion is the general activities budget and the rest is for is aviation and water enterprise funds, supported by user fees.

One slight bit of relief for citizens may come in the form of water and sewer rate increases. The recommended rate increase for water is 1.5 percent, down from 3 percent in recent years. The recommended rate increase for sewer is 9.5 percent, down from 13 percent.

“We’re trying to buy a little rate relief for our rate payers,” Schulte said.

But council members said their constituents already are struggling to pay their water bills, and they urged the city to pursue greater relief from the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Justice Department, which have imposed a massive sewer upgrade program on the city, thus requiring the giant rate increases.

Reflecting an improving economy, the budget anticipates a 3.8 percent increase in the city’s earnings tax collections, above the historical average of 2.5 percent. Property taxes and tourism taxes are also projected to increase, while other sales taxes are projected to be stable. Because public safety expenses exceed revenue growth, the budget calls for using special revenue fund reserves, which the city can do for a few more years but is not a sustainable long-term financial solution.

Public safety costs are projected to increase from $416 million to $435 million. Of that, the Police Department budget is slated to increase to $250.8 million, up from $242.5 million this year. The Fire Department spending is projected to grow from $155 million to $166.3 million. Much of the police and fire increases are for wage and benefit raises rather than for more police officers or firefighters. The Municipal Court budget is actually expected to go down somewhat, to $18.1 million. Schulte noted that traffic citations are at record lows, down from 250,000 in 2010 to fewer than 130,000 now.

Details of the budget are at kcmo.gov/finance.

The budget debate heats up as residents are also weighing an $800 million infrastructure bond package that will be on the April 4 ballot. But that bond program is separate from this year’s budget plan, which assumes annual infrastructure spending remains at current levels.

The following public hearings on the budget are scheduled from 10 a.m. to noon:

▪ Feb. 18 at Mohart Center, 3200 Wayne Ave.

▪ Feb. 25 at Woodneath Library Center, 8900 N.E. Flintlock Road.

▪ March 4 at Southeast Community Center, 4201 E. 63rd St.

The council’s finance committee will also take public testimony on the budget at its weekly meetings at City Hall, 8:30 a.m. on March 1, March 8 and March 22.

This story was originally published February 9, 2017 at 2:02 PM with the headline "Kansas City budget proposal has big spending boost for police and fire."