Non-profits keep money as Sahuarita OKs $76 million budget

The town council on Monday approved a $76 million budget for 2009-10, and after hearing impassioned pleas about three non-profit agencies, decided not to cut the $72,000 they will receive.

The council also directed staff to find ways by mid-September to reduce the $2.05 million deficit in the General Fund operating budget to $1 million, by a combination of spending cuts and revenue increases.

The council also heard from finance director A.C. Marriotti that economic troubles have hit the construction industry so hard that bids for the first phase of the expansion of Sahuarita Road are in the $7 million to $8 million range, far below the $12 million budgeted. Bids were filed June 10, and a more complete discussion is expected at the July 13 Town Council meeting, where a contractor could be approved.

Town Manager Jim Stahle told the council that the Sahuarita Road savings will not allow for spending elsewhere, but will likely go to the next phase of the expansion — from La Villita Road east to Country Club Road — a portion that is not fully funded. That stretch that will include a costly bridge across the Santa Cruz River and a bridge, tunnel or reconfiguration of the intersection at the Union Pacific Railroad east of Nogales Highway.

The budget was approved by a 6-1 vote, with Town Council member Kara Egbert voting no.

Egbert later said she had explained in detail at the June 8 meeting that her only opposition to the budget was to using taxpayers’ money to fund non-profit agencies.

“When the government takes taxpayers money and distributes those funds to charities, it forces individuals to support non-profits whose mission they may not agree” with, and she does not believe government has that authority, Egbert said.

The budget calls for the town to use some of its contingency fund to cover the $2 million shortfall in the General Fund, and council member Duane Blumberg proposed that the town find ways to cut that amount in half, so as not to use up the contingency fund so quickly during a recession.

At the June 8 meeting, several council members indicated support for cutting the funding of non-profits by 10 percent, the same as the cut in the town operating budget. Vice Mayor Phil Conklin on June 8 supported a 10 percent cut, but on Monday drew applause when he said, “I feel that once we made the unofficial budget on May 1 (at a town council study session), we made a certain commitment to the community and to go back on that would be reneging.”

Mayor Lynne Skelton long has called for a town council policy outlining how the town should evaluate requests from outside agencies. However, on Monday she said that upon reflection she felt that because the non-profits went through a “thorough” town budgeting process and the resultant draft budget called for $72,000, she would vote for the draft budget.

The council was lobbied by officials and volunteers with the three agencies, Green Valley Assistance Services, Green Valley Community Food Bank and S.T.O.P. (Sahuarita Team Offers Prevention).

Officials of the Food Bank, which was awarded $19,000, and GVAS, which received $43,000, noted that many of their clients live in Sahuarita and that town funding allows them to serve many needy people, including some who had recently lost jobs.

Of the $10,000 requested by the S.T.O.P. program, $7,000 is for a summer activity program for middle school children at Anza Trail School, former council member and current S.T.O.P. board member Marty Moreno said.

Oldham announced that he recently married Kate McCarthy.

pfranchine@sahuaritasun.com | 547-9738