Slush fund

‘Shared sacrifice’ isn’t on the minds of Houston City Council.

City Council loves its slushies — and no, we don’t mean a frozen Big Red from Buc-ee’s.

We’re talking slush funds, as in the milliondollar district project Council District Service programs that councilmembers approved in Wednesday’s budget vote.

City Council can’t fully fund five police cadet classes. Deferred building maintenance goes ignored for another year. The city’s savings account has to be tapped to close the budget gap. But, in a 10-7 vote, City Council ballooned its district funds up to seven-figures (“City Council OKs budget, ups funds for each district,” page A3, Thursday).

This is a problem of city needs versus city wants.

Houston needs more police officers and affordable housing for the working poor. Houston needs to maintain city buildings and fix potholes. City Council doesn’t need more money to spend on short-term programs that provide little more than bragging rights.

In the past, council members have been caught spending their district budgets on items such as yard signs and food catering for community events. There’s nothing wrong with a little nosh during a long meeting, but there’s nothing right about it being a priority at City Hall.

Members have also spent their funds on overtime and equipment for the Houston Police Department and the Houston Fire Department. Upgrades and extra hours are little more than Band-Aids on a broken leg. Only bigpicture priorities can provide the structural reform and funding that those departments need.

Beyond the dollars and cents of a tight budget, expanding these Council District Service Funds also smacks of tone-deaf politics.

Houston’s police officers, firefighters and municipal workers just agreed to a $2.8 billion cut in retirement benefits. The new pension corridor, which limits the city’s financial burden, means that more cuts loom as a possibility in the years to come.

City taxpayers are being asked to eliminate the revenue cap, which restricts how much money City Hall can collect in property taxes each year.

Everyone has to pitch in. “Shared sacrifice” might as well be the mayor’s motto. In fact, Turner even asked Council to cut its funds as a sign of good faith. Council decided to take a different path.

Apparently the shortterm sugar-rush of a fiscal slushie is just too much for Council to pass up. City Hall had better hope that voters aren’t left feeling rotten when it comes time to raise the revenue cap.