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To Cut Or Not To Cut
It was a packed house at Calera City Hall. Inside the council chamber, the mayor is angry.
The residents seem angry, too.
"You're jeopardizing my safety," says Rebecca Graham. "You are jeopardizing my 11-month-old's safety."
And city workers are just worried.
"Obviously there is a lot of people that are concerned about this problem," says firefighter Daryl Ray.
At issue how the City of Calera will handle a drop in revenues. Some say a 20% cut in hours for police, fire and public works is too much.
"We don't want to have to go to 32, but it may come to this," Mayor Roy laments.
Others fear cutting hours or people from police and fire would affect public safety not to mention the City's ISO rating which in turn affects homeowner insurance rates.
"I think before they make cuts in important departments that they need to investigate that and not just do it across the board," says resident Rebecca Kruger.
One idea is to cut salaries and hourly wages by five-percent, from the mayor on down. Mayor Roy says he'd take the cut, but he will not give back a recent raise- which according to Councilor Ernest Montgomery amounts to an extra $100 a month.
"Now I could give it back," the mayor quipped, "but I don't intend to."
The one thing they can all agree on is no one wants more layoffs. The city let 13 people go earlier this year.
"Some of my guys that got laid off," water superintendent Bob Williams tells ABC33/40. "they still haven't found jobs to this day. So it's a tough market out there."
The mayor says the council could vote on exactly what actions to take with tin the next five to seven days.
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