Allentown Council faces looming budget deadline
Mayor’s proposed 2019 plan could become law by default next week.
Allentown City Council will take one final crack at amending the proposed 2019 budget next week — but the board may already be too late to pass a revised spending plan into law.
City Council has scheduled a meeting for 6 p.m. Monday to discuss the budget after voting down the mayor’s proposal Wednesday. During a contentious five-hour meeting earlier in the week, council members sparred over the proposed 1.5 mil tax increase included in Mayor Ray O’Connell’s spending plan, but failed to pass any amendments lowering that rate.
Allentown’s charter requires City Council to adopt a budget by Dec. 15. Otherwise, the mayor’s proposed spending plan becomes law by default.
But according to a legal opinion issued Thursday by Allentown’s legal department, council may already be too late if O’Connell chooses to dig in his heels.
If City Council does adopt an amended budget on Monday, O’Connell would have five calendar days to sign it, veto it or do nothing. Him doing nothing would allow council’s amended budget to become law.
If the mayor chooses a veto, his timing is important. If council passes an amended budget Monday and the mayor vetoes it Tuesday, council would have time to set a meeting for an override attempt. But O’Connell also could veto the plan a stroke before midnight on Dec. 15, thwarting any override attempt. In that case, O’Connell’s spending plan would become law, according to the solicitor’s office.
O’Connell said Thursday his decision will be contingent upon how council’s amendments impact his overall spending plan.
“If they would really cut into the services to the residents of the city of Allentown, I would have strong objections to that,” he said. “And if the amendments they would give me would in any way cause someone to lose their position or be laid off, I would have very strong objections to that.”
O’Connell’s $116 million spending plan relies on $7.6 million in revenue from the tax increase. For a property with a building assessed at $150,000 and with $20,000 in land value, the tax bill would increase from $903 to $1,139 — a 27 percent increase.
His proposal also calls for a 3-percent wage increase for all nonunion city employees and a one-year deferment on a loan payment to the city’s solid waste fund. O’Connell’s plan would add two firefighters and four staffers to the information technology department.
An omnibus amendment, backed by Councilmen Julio Guridy, Daryl Hendricks and Ed Zucal, gained traction Monday, but failed to muster a necessary fourth vote. That amendment called for a 10 percent cut to city overtime spending, a 10 percent cut to contracted services, and the near elimination of funding for a $300,000 affordable housing initiative. The trio proposed giving that money back to taxpayers by reducing the proposed property tax increase to 1.25 mils.
When council voted on the budget Wednesday, only three members cast affirmative ballots. The budget needed five votes to pass because it proposes an increase in the property tax.
Council President Roger MacLean, who voted against the budget but also against the omnibus amendment, said he thinks council will be able to agree on something Monday, but said he couldn’t speak to what the mayor might choose to do.
“Hopefully we can come to some compromise,” he said. “We’ve got to try something. I’m not a fan of the charter with the default budget.”
Allentown last passed a default budget for the year 2010 after council and the controller questioned whether then-Mayor Ed Pawlowski’s revenue projections were inflated. The board voted down the budget 4-3, but scheduled no special meeting to reconsider the plan.
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