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Ripon workers may take 10% cut in pay
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With a deficit of $940,000 that’s growing every month, the financial outlook for the City of Ripon is getting bleaker by the day.

And that could end up costing employees roughly 10 percent of their pay.

As part of their continued discussion on how to deal with the mounting shortfall, the Ripon City Council voted 4-1 to form a budget review committee that will take a look at various options that could end up saving Ripon the money needed to get back into the black.

One of the options on the table? Mandatory work furloughs equaling two days a month for employees that City Administrator Leon Compton said would save roughly $500,000 and amount to a 10 percent reduction in pay for workers.

Concepts also being reviewed are freezing sick leave buyout, eliminating holiday buyouts for non-essential police personnel, freezing college tuition grants for full-time employees, and requiring the use of comp time instead of overtime – items that when combined with the possibilities of voluntary or mandatory furloughs will require the approval of collective bargaining units and union representatives.

“We just got our January numbers today, and I will say that preliminary looks aren’t very good – our revenue has fallen off more,” Compton said. “And I’m not thinking that things are going to be looking much better when we come back with an update next month.”

The city has already instituted a myriad of cost-saving measures, including terminating 10 part-time animal control employees, five part-time Police Athletic League employees, and cutting out expensive community events like the annual fireworks show and the contribution to the National Night Out celebration.

The lack of funding is likely going to mean an impact on the services that residents receive.

The city has already approved freezing one full-time police officer position as well as a community service officer position – moves that when added to the reduction of police overtime, the reduction of funding for police training, and the lack of part-time help at both the animal shelter and the PAL facility will place additional strain on the department.

For Public Works Director Ted Johnston – who already lost two seasonal public works employees and is now facing the possibility of having all of his hourly workers laid off – the shortfall is also going to mean that less is going to get done.

The council already approved reducing the amount of overall park maintenance, and discussed Tuesday reassigning the crews that usually maintain the landscaping on the Jack Tone Interchange to other parts of the city – something that could end up saving $20,000.

“The question for us is what level of service are we trying to maintain?” Johnston asked. “Anytime we lose even our seasonal employees we lose productivity – there is a level that we’re going to have to hit, and we’ll have to try to hit it.”

While some employee lay-offs have already been handed down, Vice Mayor Red Nutt didn’t mince words when talking about what Ripon’s governing board is going to be facing in the future.

“When we cut people, we cut services – and what we’re talking about now in this budget is a drop in the bucket compared to what we’ll be facing in the next budget,” Nutt said. “These aren’t going to be easy choices, but that’s why we’re here – to make those choices.”

The budget review committee will now be charged with working with the respective employee bargaining units to come to an agreement on issues like furloughs and frozen benefits – something that all members of the council agreed should be handled as quickly as possible because stalling the process will likely only make it worse.

And even though the concept of facing a mandatory furlough will likely hit Debbie Meeuwse – the wife of a city employee – hard in the pocketbook, she still said she’s willing to face it if it means that people don’t have to lose jobs.

“I’m not opposed to furloughs, even though there will likely be a deep cut in my house if that happens because I recently lost my job,” Meeuwse said. “But this is a giving community, and in a lot of ways we are our brother’s keepers and I’m willing to give up my 10 percent so that somebody else can put food on their table.”