4:15pm | The City of Long Beach may have scored a break in its ongoing budget crisis this week, when yesterday the offices of the City Attorney, City Prosecutor and City Auditor announced that they will agree to a plan that eases the strain on Long Beach’s $18.5 million deficit that must be balanced by September 15.
Employees in those three offices will take scheduled salary increases and apply them to pension costs in order to relieve the City of Long Beach from their responsibility to pay that money. The strategy was one of the ideas put forth by Mayor Bob Foster and City Manager Pat West to ease high pension costs in a troubled financial period for the city. The City Council must approve the decision before it is implemented.
“The nationwide financial crisis has created new challenges for Long Beach,” City Attorney Bob Shannon said in a press release. “We appreciate and accept the Mayor’s tough but necessary recommendations, and we look forward to working with him and with the City Council in an effort to resolve these challenges, while providing the best services possible for the citizens of Long Beach.”
Employees in those departments also agreed to reduce retirement benefits for new employees, calculating benefits based on the employee’s highest three years of salary rather than the highest one year of salary earned.
“We believe that cooperation from the City’s public employee unions is critical to help avoid significant reductions in service and prevent further layoffs,” City Auditor Laura Doud said in a statement. “With teamwork, Long Beach will remain on course to not only survive these difficult times over the next few years, but to thrive as a vibrant city well into the future.”
While a temporary victory for the city, perhaps even with long-term solutions, this move in itself with not solve Long Beach’s drastic budget issues. The mayor must present a balanced budget to the City Council by September 15 and there are still millions more that must be found.