Scranton, Pa. We don't have money to pay workers

[Linux23]

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505245_162-57467111/scranton-pa.-we-dont-have-money-to-pay-workers/

"Scranton Mayor Chris Doherty's plan to pay nearly 400 employees no more than the $7.25 per-hour minimum wage rate stems from a political stalemate over how to resolve a massive cash shortfall in the city's operating budget."

This is really really disturbing.

 

[dmcowen674]

Scranton, Pa. We don't have money to pay workers

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505245_162-57467111/scranton-pa.-we-dont-have-money-to-pay-workers/

"Scranton Mayor Chris Doherty's plan to pay nearly 400 employees no more than the $7.25 per-hour minimum wage rate stems from a political stalemate over how to resolve a massive cash shortfall in the city's operating budget."


Business administrator Ryan McGowan said Thursday that Scranton had just $5,000 left after setting aside $300,000 to meet payroll at the minimum wage rate.

Normal payroll would be roughly $950,000 to $1.1 million, depending on overtime, McGowan said. But the city is projected to fall short of its $71 million budget by nearly $17 million, or 35 percent of the revenue it expects to receive the rest of the year.

Doherty wants to get bank loans to fill the gap and refinance debt, but city officials say banks are waiting for the City Council to approve Doherty's recovery plan.

That plan includes a property tax increase of 78 percent over the next three years and a new garbage collection fee of $22 phased in over two years.

================================
This is really really disturbing.

What's so disturbing?

The city is obviously spending too much.

It needs to be dissolved immediately

Everyone can move somewhere else that isn't spending more than they are taking in. Hard to find these days but have to start somewhere.

Everyone in Scranton is going to move anyway with the 78% property tax increase.

 

[Jaskalas]

When is the Fed going to step up and bailout the state and local governments?

 

[nextJin]

democrat

 

[CPA]

It must be those damned, rich, America-hating Republicans. Oh, and corporations and rich people not paying their fair share. Oh and that draconian Republican Mayor. It's all his fault.

 

[nextJin]

It must be those damned, rich, America-hating Republicans. Oh, and corporations and rich people not paying their fair share. Oh and that draconian Republican Mayor. It's all his fault.

well according to the article they will be paying their fair share here shortly.

 

[Linux23]

So their solution is to pass the bill to the residents and continue to spend unchecked?

 

[CaptainGoodnight]

What's so disturbing?

The city is obviously spending too much.

It needs to be dissolved immediately

Everyone can move somewhere else that isn't spending more than they are taking in. Hard to find these days but have to start somewhere.

Everyone in Scranton is going to move anyway with the 78% property tax increase.

You know so little of actual conservative thought, it's entertaining.

 

[nehalem256]

This year is Scranton's 20th anniversary of entering into a state program for financially distressed cities

Seems like this has been a problem for a while.

 

[spacejamz]

78% Property Tax Increase??? damn...

http://www.city-data.com/city/Scranton-Pennsylvania.html
Median real estate property taxes paid for housing units with mortgages in 2009: $1,683
Median real estate property taxes paid for housing units with no mortgage in 2009: $1,718

if the 78% goes through, it would jack up these amounts to around $3000

 

[Cerb]

So, nobody else read this and thought, "they could pay them in bananas!" ? :sneaky:

We'll see more fun like this in the near future, over more of the country.

 

[Gunslinger08]

I actually feel bad for local governments. The federal government has a lot more discretionary spending that could be cut. Local governments, at least around here, are stretched to the max already.

Revenues are down considerably because:
1. Home values have dropped dramatically.
2. A lot of people can't afford their mortgages, which means their property taxes aren't being paid from escrow.
3. Federal dollars to states have dropped. This affects already tight state budgets, resulting in cuts of local aide.
4. Other revenue streams (ex. local income/sales taxes, business licenses, building permits, etc.) have dropped due to decreases consumption.
5. New unfunded state and federal mandates decrease revenue available for existing programs.

Government workers around here haven't gotten raises in at least 4 or 5 years, which is probably true for a lot of private sector workers as well. Expenses have been cut back a lot:
1. Teachers that quit or retire aren't being replaced, unless it's state mandated (ex. special ed).
2. School administration positions have been eliminated.
3. Quite a few school sports programs that didn't pay for themselves have been cut.
4. Overtime for police and other eligible workers has been cut.

I don't know what local governments will do if this continues for several more years. Smaller localities are going to start losing all of their employees to larger localities that still have money to hire new employees, give raises, and pay higher salaries. The quality of services, especially the more public facing ones (ex. public schools, police, fire, etc.) is going to suffer due to increased class sizes, inexperienced teachers replacing experienced teachers who switch counties, fewer police patrols and units, etc.

 

[OutHouse]

so if the city does not have the money to pay the workers and did send out checks in the full ammount would those checks bounce?

I really dont get governments like this. YOU ARE SPENDING TOO MUCH FUCKING MONEY!!!!! Jesus why is that to hard to understand for these clowns??

i live in a small town and our little government stays well within its budget.

 

[OutHouse]

I actually feel bad for local governments. The federal government has a lot more discretionary spending that could be cut. Local governments, at least around here, are stretched to the max already.

Revenues are down considerably because:
1. Home values have dropped dramatically.
2. A lot of people can't afford their mortgages, which means their property taxes aren't being paid from escrow.
3. Federal dollars to states have dropped. This affects already tight state budgets, resulting in cuts of local aide.
4. Other revenue streams (ex. local income/sales taxes, business licenses, building permits, etc.) have dropped due to decreases consumption.
5. New unfunded state and federal mandates decrease revenue available for existing programs.

Government workers around here haven't gotten raises in at least 4 or 5 years, which is probably true for a lot of private sector workers as well. Expenses have been cut back a lot:
1. Teachers that quit or retire aren't being replaced, unless it's state mandated (ex. special ed).
2. School administration positions have been eliminated.
3. Quite a few school sports programs that didn't pay for themselves have been cut.
4. Overtime for police and other eligible workers has been cut.

I don't know what local governments will do if this continues for several more years. Smaller localities are going to start losing all of their employees to larger localities that still have money to hire new employees, give raises, and pay higher salaries. The quality of services, especially the more public facing ones (ex. public schools, police, fire, etc.) is going to suffer due to increased class sizes, inexperienced teachers replacing experienced teachers who switch counties, fewer police patrols and units, etc.

yea that is what should happen. if you dont have the money you dont have the money. If my income was cut i would immediately start cutting things i really dont need like netflix and other niceties. you dont go making people pay you more when they themselves cant afford any new expenses. this stupid town leaders are beyond retarded.

 

[Lithium381]

so if the city does not have the money to pay the workers and did send out checks in the full ammount would those checks bounce?

I really dont get governments like this. YOU ARE SPENDING TOO MUCH FUCKING MONEY!!!!! Jesus why is that to hard to understand for these clowns??

i live in a small town and our little government stays well within its budget.

Same could be said for personal finances as could be said for a large corporation as could be said for a government entity, large or small. Money in needs to be > than money out. It's not hard.

As another poster said revenues for smaller governments rise and fall with the economy due to declining property values and sales taxes whereas the federal government has no correlation between revenue/spending. Typically pensions are a large part of it, long term promises being used to avoid short term expendetures. Unions force this it seems. Union demands a pay raise, city can't afford it so they say "instead of a payraise now, we'll double your retirement!!!" good luck with that long term.

 

[actuarial]

yea that is what should happen. if you dont have the money you dont have the money. If my income was cut i would immediately start cutting things i really dont need like netflix and other niceties. you dont go making people pay you more when they themselves cant afford any new expenses. this stupid town leaders are beyond retarded.

I'm not sure you can compare 'netflix and other niceties' with 'police and fire departments'.

 

[Lithium381]

I'm not sure you can compare 'netflix and other niceties' with 'police and fire departments'.

but whenever faced with having to make cuts, governments always threaten to cut essential services and education first so people get scared and agree to pony up. Same thing the dems did with the "debt crisis" last year and repubs not raising the debt ceiling. Instead of scaling back one of the hundreds of executive agencies they said they would have to cut back on essential services. . . .

 

[OutHouse]

I'm not sure you can compare 'netflix and other niceties' with 'police and fire departments'.

who said I was? the mayor didn't cut those pubic services but did cut their pay along with his own pay... no firetrucks got sold, nobody got laid off the services are still there but the people providing those services are doing it at min wage.

 

[actuarial]

who said I was? the mayor didn't cut those pubic services but did cut their pay along with his own pay... no firetrucks got sold, nobody got laid off the services are still there but the people providing those services are doing it at min wage.

Ideally the services will still be there, but how long will the firefighters continue to work for min. wage?

 

[spacejamz]

It is sad the outrage is on the minimum wage that has to be paid to the workers because there is no money in the city budget and not the political process where the mayor and the city council cannot come to an agreement how to resolve the town's finances, therefore cannot get the funding to make payroll.

It is not like Scranton woke up one morning and said, "shit we only have $300K in our accounts and we need $1M to make pay our workers"...

 

[Doppel]

When this was on NPR yesterday the city apparently had the option to vote for some tax increases but the council instead (I think against mayor's desire, but cannot be positive) thought they'd get money from elsewhere. That didn't pan out, so the city was down to $5,000 and thus the minimum wage. Funny how you need money to pay bills, isn't it?

 

[Nintendesert]

The people running that city got confused on where they were serving. They thought they were serving at the National level where you don't need to balance the books.

 

[1prophet]

It is sad the outrage is on the minimum wage that has to be paid to the workers because there is no money in the city budget and not the political process where the mayor and the city council cannot come to an agreement how to resolve the town's finances, therefore cannot get the funding to make payroll.

It is not like Scranton woke up one morning and said, "shit we only have $300K in our accounts and we need $1M to make pay our workers"...

The outrage should have been over thirty years ago when the good higher paying jobs in the private sector which in turn pay the taxes for the public sectors jobs were being systematically eliminated or outsourced.

This is going to become commonplace across the country as the middle class shrinks and the ranks of poor and rich swell.

http://economywatch.msnbc.msn.com/_...ns-face-budget-squeeze-in-downturns-wake?lite

 

[woodie1]

Ideally the services will still be there, but how long will the firefighters continue to work for min. wage?

Yeah, the job opportunities for them are endless.

 

[ShawnD1]

but whenever faced with having to make cuts, governments always threaten to cut essential services and education first so people get scared and agree to pony up. Same thing the dems did with the "debt crisis" last year and repubs not raising the debt ceiling. Instead of scaling back one of the hundreds of executive agencies they said they would have to cut back on essential services. . . .

They do that with school budgets too.
-new football field
-new television in each classroom
-new marble floors
-not enough money for teachers so we'll put 60 kids in each class room