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Questions and Answers Regarding
General Fund-supported departments
What is accomplished by these midyear budget reductions to the General Fund?
They reduce General Fund expenditures by an additional $7 million to address potential problems in the 2002 and 2003 budgets. This represents slightly more than 1 percent of the city's 2002 Adopted General Fund budget of $640 million. These reductions bring the 2002 General Fund Budget down to $635 million.
How were the savings achieved?
At the direction of Mayor Nickels, these savings were generated mainly through realizing additional administrative efficiencies, foregoing or delaying one-time expenditures, and eliminating duplicated efforts. These represent just the beginning of the city's budget reduction efforts for the next year. As a reminder, projections indicate that the city will face at least a $30 million General Fund budget gap in 2003.
What's an "efficiency"? Can you give some examples?
Examples of efficiencies include having fewer, smaller City vehicles; streamlining administrative processes to make faster decisions; and evaluating administrative vacancies to make sure positions need to be filled. Some of these are included in the 2002 reductions, while others will be a major focus in the 2003 budget.
What are some examples of duplicated efforts?
The city funds a variety of "niche" programs that are customized to relatively small groups. This is especially true in the health and human services program areas. While these programs are often valuable, there are other programs that provide similar services to somewhat broader audiences.
What percentage of the overall General Fund Budget will be cut in 2003-2004?
It is too early to say. The city's 2003-2004 budget process is just beginning and the mayor's 2003-2004 spending guidelines to departments will be based, in part, on the General Fund revenue forecast (due in early April).
What's the difference between a "frozen" and an "abrogated" position?
Each city employee occupies a position in the city's personnel system. There are 11,080 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions in the city's 2002 Adopted Budget. When a position is frozen, it is held vacant for a period of time, but the position remains in the city's personnel system - the city's FTE count remains at 11,080. When a position is abrogated, e.g., eliminated, it is removed from the city's personnel system - if one full-time position is abrogated, the city's FTE count drops to 11,079.
You've frozen or cut positions but haven't affected direct services? How?
Most often, workloads have been re-prioritized so that direct services are not affected. In many cases, tasks performed by the frozen or cut position were spread among other program staff. In fewer cases, we may see an increase in turnaround time or a backlog as a result of this workload shifting.
Who took the biggest hits?
These reductions were spread among the largest city departments. Administrative departments generally received the largest cuts. On a percentage basis, no department's reduction exceeded 3 percent of its General Fund budget. Public Safety departments were asked to take 0.5 percent reductions. Please refer to the "Summary of Midyear 2002 General Subfund Reductions" handout that was provided for department-by-department detail.
Questions and Answers Regarding Seattle City Light
How much is City Light reducing its spending?
City Light will spend about $13 million less on operations and about $24 million less on capital programs, for a total savings of $37 million in 2002.
Will reduced spending on operation and maintenance affect the reliability of electrical service?
City Light has tried to reduce spending in areas with the least impact on customers. Reductions will be spread throughout the utility so as not to overburden any one area. The reductions could, for example, affect the amount of time it takes the utility to restore a small, isolated outage, hook up a new residence to the system or repair a streetlight. Customer service staffing in the utility's call center will not be reduced.
Questions and Answers Regarding Seattle Public Utilities
How much is Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) reducing its spending this year?
SPU is reducing $6.7 million in operating costs and another $4.9 million in spending on equipment and projects for its water system (capital improvement).
How will budget reductions at SPU affect customers?
Seattle Public Utilities will continue to provide high-quality water, sewer, drainage and garbage services. The reductions SPU is proposing are mostly "invisible" to its customers. There are no reductions from the 2002 budget for SPU's Customer Service division and only minimal reductions in its Field Operations division. These two divisions respond to telephone calls, manage billing and perform new service and repairs. SPU's reductions are mostly in administrative costs and in the delay of work on certain projects. SPU is not laying off any permanent employees.
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