THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, May 14, 1996 TAG: 9605140001
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A14 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Medium: 69 lines
Virginia Beach City Council is slated to vote today on its $904 million proposed operating budget and 3.2-cent property-tax increase.
Recent fine-tuning of the original plan turned up an additional $7 million. This windfall would put more money into schools, add three more case workers to handle child-abuse cases and fund several other worthy programs.
We are dubious, however, about allocating $183,000 to ``enhance'' recycling drop-off centers. This kind of spending is a disincentive for the city to quickly pursue new curbside recycling after the present arrangement with the Southeastern Public Service Authority expires in July.
Schools will get $4.8 million of the newly found $7 million, which should help ease the financial crunch of an excellent - but troubled - school system and could be interpreted as a vote of confidence in the new school superintendent, Timothy Jenney.
City workers, including teachers, will get a much-deserved 4.5 percent pay hike. However, the city does not seem likely to give in to a coalition of police organizations calling itself Code Blue which lobbied intensively for higher pay increases and better benefits.
At an acrimonious hearing last week, representatives of several police organizations said the only thing lower than police wages was police morale.
This is true. And the city must shoulder some of the blame for morale problems. Two years ago, City Manager Jim Spore proposed studying wages of city workers by comparing them to those of municipal workers in cities of comparable size. Spore's goal was to bring Beach workers, including police officers, up to the 65th percentile nationally.
This logic was faulty: Comparing Virginia Beach to cities like Miami with more crime and a higher tax base made no sense. When the high cost of this plan became clear, Mr. Spore decided on a new course of action. Virginia Beach ought to strive to pay its workers better than any other city in Hampton Roads, he said.
This makes sense. Unfortunately, it amounted to changing the rules in the middle of the game and made many police officers feel, understandably, that they'd been victims of a shell game.
The city must mend fences with its police officers this year. It can be dangerous to the city and its inhabitants to be policed by disgruntled law-enforcement officers.
On the other hand, the police officers must understand that public money is not limitless. And by engaging in juvenile behavior, such as trying to embarrass the mayor and City Council by flying banners overhead during a visit by the Queen of Norway last fall, those groups alienate the very public they're trying to win over to their side.
A letter sent out by Code Blue last week contained veiled threats that in retaliation for the new budget, officers would try to harm tourism by demonstrating at prime tourist destinations and in cities targeted by Virginia Beach for tourism.
This tactic would be counterproductive. If successful, it would lower everyone's wages as tourist dollars dry up.
The city's proposed tax hike has been less controversial than expected and has only one vocal foe on council - Nancy Parker. Opponents of the increased tax rate point out that because real-estate assessments also rose this year, real-estate tax bills will reflect more than just 3.2 cents per hundred dollars of assessed value for the average homeowner next year.
This is a moderate, well-reasoned budget. The increases in spending seem justified, and the emphasis on public education is a step in the right direction. by CNB