Free Cash, Again

So, the discussion over whether or not to use free cash for the police union raises continues. Mayor Dan Mylott and City Council President Jody Joseph are talking things through.

Mylott said he's "not sure there's another way" outside of free cash to pay for the raises. It's either a hard-core bargaining position, or a damning indictment on how he put the budget together. Let's discuss.

When putting the FY07 budget together, Mylott knew raises were coming. In fact, we're fairly certain it came up during budget discussions and the general message was raise funding was included in the budget. Maybe it was an unspoken reliance on free cash at the time.

Mylott can't refund free cash during the course of the year, but he can free up "raise money" tucked into budgets for other things. This might get confusing, but read on:

Let's say Mylott takes $200,000 out of free cash for the police raises. Later, he needs $200,000 for snow and ice or something else. In the spring, he proposes a transfer of $200,000 from the police budget to pay for snow and ice.

It's really a series of accounting maneuvers, but the end result is that the police raises were in the police budget all the time, but Mylott was just moving the money around. Perfect? Not really, but perfectly fine.

The thing is, Mylott has given no indication that is the case. It could be a negotiating ploy -- he's still working with two unions and doesn't want to make it public knowledge that there is money socked away. It could be a case of budget dilemna, which all public discourse at this point points to.

Hopefully Mylott has given Joseph the dope on what he's up to, and that are things behind the scenes that makes the situation better than it appears. But until we know otherwise, it's OK to be concerned that this is a shaky situation.