Bossier City Council weighs funding options
Last Tuesday’s Bossier City Council meeting was possibly the longest of the year at one and a half hours – but it was also one of the most reassuring with respect to city budget issues and the course the council has taken since 2009’s budget crisis.
First, a reminder about how the 2009 budget problems occurred: For several years prior to 2009, the council acquiesced to public opinion, both local and national, that called for any and all increases in public safety funding increases as requested by public safety leadership.
Retrospectively and quite understandably, this was in response to the events of Sept. 11, 2001.
But the funding issues that drew rst on riverboat casino revenues and later on budget reserve funds were not limited to public safety.
That spending was the result of what was believed to be public sentiment instead of the reality of what was coming into the public sc in the form of revenue and what was going out – as a result of the council’s view of public demand.
The two council agenda items that were the subject of lengthy discussion were an ordinance to appropriate $270,000 from sales tax capital improvement funds to extend a small street in a residential area across the Arthur Ray Teague Parkway from Diamond Jacks and Boomtown Casinos and an ordinance to appropriate $35,000 from the general fund budget to extend Sportran bus service to Harrah’s Louisiana Downs.
The bus service currently extends to Bossier Parish Community College and is generally offered in concert with the college’s course offering schedule.
First, Councilman Larry Hanisee’s measure to appropriate $270,000 to extend Lillian Street to Maple Street … and apparently not a hard gure but one seemingly pulled from thin air.
While members of the Lillian/Maple Street community spoke in favor of the measure, council members who actually visited the area weren’t quite as con dent of the need or price tag.
Notably, and while not an issue raised at the meeting, this area has been designated as a commercial overlay district, meaning that property values would be appraised at the commercial, not residential, value.
Two houses would have to be sacri ced for the road extension. Moreover, there was no immediately available estimate of the cost of the road construction, so the $270,000 figure was guesswork, more or less.
At-large council member Tim Larkin described his visit to the neighborhood to get a “clear understanding of the neighborhood and intersection” that connects it to the ART Parkway at Robert E. Lee Street. Larkin said he waited at the intersection for “eight minutes for a car to come” and further noted while he was not a safety expert, he did not see a safety issue at the intersection.
From Larkin’s point of view, if the issue was safety, the city should look for a quali ed safety opinion and a true cost analysis of the issue.
He expressed concern that proponents of the measure look closely at state law that instructs that a bona de safety issue exist before any consideration of expropriating property for a new roadway for which the need has not been demonstrated.
The extension of the bus service ordinance issue received similar critical analysis from District 4 council member David Jones, who pointed out that the $35,000 cost of extending service from the east Bossier terminus at BPCC to Harrah’s Louisiana Downs and surrounding businesses would meet only part of the suggested transportation need – and thus likely cost signi cantly more.
But the largely motivating contributions to deciding the fate of both issues came from Larkin and his at-large colleague David Montgomery.
Per Larkin, with respect to the road extension issue, but pertinent to both: “What occurs to me is what we are trying to do here is not being approached in an orderly manner. I don’t think this is the way to go about the business of the city. … The two things that have come up are things we discuss in our budget process … which we’ll discuss in just two months.”
Montgomery said he echoed what Larkin said and was adamant in his conviction that what his fellow council members were advocating was de cit spending. “ … No matter how small this is, it’s de cit spending that’s what got government into trouble … change based on emotional pleas,” Montgomery said.
He recalled, “In 2009, we were at a $6.8 million de cit, and it all started with [the] utmost of innocence. We have to maintain control of the budget process; this needs to go through the process. … I implore the council to adhere to the process.”
In the end, both issues were defeated by majority council votes. If the proponents of either or both of these issues are serious about the need for funding, we will see such discussion at the appropriate time – during 2014 budget discussion and planning.
It’s reassuring to know some lessons are lasting when it comes to issues of public funding of questionable measures.
Marty Carlson, a freelance writer, has been covering local news for the past 13 years. She can be reached via email at [email protected].
