
Erin Baldwin Day
54:27 - 55:23
"the tax cap is not the only structural limitation or constraint that we have or the only place where we can consider how to better fund services and infrastructure in Anchorage. And I mean, I think there are other things that are in motion that do provide different structural options in terms of how we pay for things. And I think we need to have a— we as a body need to have more conversations about what those tradeoffs look like."
“the tax cap is not the only structural limitation or constraint that we have or the only place where we can consider how to better fund services and infrastructure in Anchorage. And I mean, I think there are other things that are in motion that do provide different structural options in terms of how we pay for things. And I think we need to have a— we as a body need to have more conversations about what those tradeoffs look like.”
Yeah, I think these are, um, you know, when, when we talk in the— this AR about, you know, resolving that this the fiscal future of the municipality will remain a priority of the assembly. I think what that signals is that these are exactly the kinds of conversations we need to be having because, I mean, the tax cap is not the only structural limitation or constraint that we have or the only place where we can consider how to better fund services and infrastructure in Anchorage. And I mean, I think there are other things that are in motion that do provide different structural options in terms of how we pay for things. And I think we need to have a— we as a body need to have more conversations about what those tradeoffs look like. For example, are we willing to continue funding drainage projects basically exclusively using bond funding and just chase deferred maintenance to the tune of $1 billion in perpetuity?
The Anchorage Police and Fire departments are running well over their approved overtime budgets, and OMB Director Ona Brouse told the Assembly Budget and Finance Committee on Thursday that overtime allocations have not been updated in at least four years, with the continuation-budget baseline tracing to roughly 2010.
