CANDIDATE
QUESTIONNAIRE
CANDIDATE
QUESTIONNAIRE
PEKIN CITY COUNCIL
14. Are there opportunities to cut expenses? Are there deparments that are over-staffed? Where, specifically, would you support cuts?
Rick Hilst: Did not respond to the questionnaire.
Karen Hohimer: As far as cutting expenses, YES. I would like to see an employee audit in every department except police/fire. Having been married to a city employee, I have many thoughts on where cuts should take place but will save that until after the audit.
John Abel: We have the opportunity to save a considerable amount of money on our pension payments. Public hearing will be in January. Pensions are a huge problem with almost all cities.
In the last year our infrastructure committee was formed. Infrastructure problems throughout the city, some being a problem for 10-20 years are being taken care of at no cost to taxpayers. We are using impound fees to fund the projects, many being done by our own street department at savings compared to going out for bids, etc.
David Nutter: There are always opportunities to reduce expenses. Review the 2016 Effeciency Study staffing realignments compared to current operations. This may offer realignment opportunities. The 17/18 audit results are not available as of 1/7/19. Once complete and reviewed staffing can be addressed in the budget.
Matthew T. Tucker (Tyler):This may not fully answer the questions but this is my honest reply. Depending on the circumstances, believe a budget is forever expands and shrinks. It has been my experience people seem to not care as much about expenditures if it isn’t their money they are spending or if they don’t have some sort of “stake in the game”. When it comes to cutting budgets, I would like to see the department heads and the employees be given some incentives to come up with solutions to cutting their own budgets or ideas where we can spend money to make money or how some funds need to be spent as preventive measure and save us money in the future.
As a hypothetical example. If there is a better solution than salt to be used on our roads (which destroys the roads) and an employee presents it to us, this employee should receive a bonus. Why not “reward” an individual who can show us, if we use their alternative solution, we can save funds from not having to repair pot holes, curbs, roads…. Why shouldn’t they be compensated?
If someone in the waste disposal department was able to show proof that by having two employees on one truck can reduce the starts and stops and decrease the time it takes to pick up garbage compared to only having one employee thus reducing the number of trucks (gas, maintenance, insurance, wear and tear…) why shouldn’t that individual be rewarded?
It is my understanding there are two aspects within the police department should be re-instated. The first, is I would like to see the Police Liaison at the housing area re-instated. I understand this program was successful in decreasing crime in the area as the tenants felt comfortable going to the police as they had a better understanding of who the police were as people and not just law enforcement. Of course, when you reduce crime, you reduce all of the expense associated with the crime. This also gets back to making people feel better about where they live and the positive cascading effect it has on the community as a whole.
The second aspect within our police force I believe needs to be re-instated is the motorcycle police patrols. From what I understand, the two motorcycle officers were able to better patrol our streets and recognize traffic violations than a patrol car. It is also my understanding these officers were able to actually increase the revenue generated from speeding tickets and hand-free violations. These officers were able to more than pay for themselves and the two motorcycles. If this is true, why would we not still have them patrolling our streets?
While in The Marines, I was fortunate enough to be under the command of a Naval Commander, Commander Grenin. Commander Grenin was a Navy Corpsman attached to The Marines in Vietnam. He once told me, he quickly learned those in charge who were truly successful all had one thing in common. They leaned on, trusted and listened to the grunts out on the frontlines. The grunts on the frontlines who were “in the thick of it” knew much more about what was actually happening than any officer “in the rear with the gear”. This is the approach I will take as a Pekin City Council Member.
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