Fairhope Financial Chairman Warns: "City Not Meeting Financial Goals." Special Council Meeting Called

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Despite recent tax/utility rate increases; and in stark contrast to recent public comments made by the Mayor-- at the last Council meeting (April 26th), Financial Committee Chairman Charles Zunk warned the city did not meet its financial goals for the first half of FY 2010; and offered proposals for corrective action to the Council for the second half.
Some deficiencies cited: 1) Adequate "rainy day" funds are not being accumulated; 2) Various Departments still have insufficient funds for basic maintenance--and critical improvements; 3) Utilities still have insufficient funding for debt repayment, infrastructure improvement, and critical future projects.
Problem areas identified by the Committee: 1) Increased golf course expenses; 2) Increased employee healthcare benefit costs; 3) Increased salaries/overtime; 3) Legal expenses; 4) un-expected natural gas rate reduction; 5) Others not mentioned.
In the report, Zunk poses the rhetorical question: "Why not just wait for things to get better?" Answers: "Ask Mobile. . . how that's worked out for them." "The definition of Lack of fiscal responsibility is doing the same things over and over again--and expecting different results."
A special Council work session was called for May 17th at 2PM.
[Publisher's Note: The full written report will be published here at a later date.]