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Rooke disagrees with closed budget discussions

By G. Michael Dobbs

Managing Editor



SPRINGFIELD Mayor Domenic Sarno said last week that his exclusion of members of the City Council from budget meetings is simply a prerogative of being the city's chief executive.

City Councilor Tim Rooke sees the lack of participation as a lost opportunity for councilors to better understand the needs of the city departments.

Rooke, in particular, attended such meetings in the part under Mayor Charles Ryan and Michael Albano. He again called last week for Sarno to open his door.

Sarno, though, explained to Reminder Publications that he is looking forward to giving the City Council the budget to discuss at their own set of hearings.

"I really don't see this as an issue," Sarno said.

Sarno said he wants to give the council the budget as quickly as possible but is waiting for financial figures from the state. In the meantime, he is continuing meetings with department heads to review their needs for the coming fiscal year.

"I'm not doing anything illegal or out of the norm," Sarno said.

Rooke said Sarno's stand is "counter-productive."

"I respect his opinion, but I disagree with it," he added.

Rooke said he and other councilors have concerns about specific issues in a number of departmental budgets that could be addressed by attending those meetings. For instance, he cited the $700,000 that is predicted as towing revenue for the city in the Police Department budget. That project might actually be lower in reality and he wondered what the strategy would be to deal with a lesser amount.

He is concerned about the $14 million the city spends annually on school bussing. He said $7 million of that is transporting students with special needs, but he wonders if the standard bussing could be decreased.

"In the history of the City Council, they've always been involved working on the budget,' Rooke said.

The only meetings from which councilors been excluded were the ones between the mayor and his financial team when they are finalizing the budget.

Rooke said these budget hearings would also be the venue to explore new initiatives, such as the creation for a small business coordinator who would to create and retain businesses in the city and a rental occupancy certificate program that could generate additional revenues for the city.

He said the City Council has had more access to the budget process through the state-imposed Finance Control Board than the "transparent and inclusive Sarno administration."