Staff Writer
During its second budget hearing Thursday, the City Council Finance Committee tentatively agreed to an amendment that would restore library hours to five branches while also reopening four regional branches on Sunday.
Council member Denise Lee proposed the amendment, which takes $789,000 from the library’s purchased materials budget allocated for DVDs and CDs and redistributes the money for the hours.
The funds represent 21 percent of the materials budget.
“I think this is the appropriate place to take this money,” said Lee.
The affected branches include Maxville, Murray Hill, Brentwood, Eastside and Westbrook. The affected regional branches include Highlands Regional, Beaches Regional, South Mandarin Regional and Charles Webb Wesconnett.
During the meeting, Lee said she is not suggesting DVDs and CDs aren’t important assets but believed keeping the libraries open in general would serve more purpose educationally and would resolve some of the conversation in the community.
And there has been conversation.
Citizens, especially those advocating for the Murray Hill branch, attended the mayor’s budget address in July, subsequent Council meetings and each of the first two Finance budget hearings to voice their concern over the reduction in hours.
Nancy Morgan, one of the Friends of the Murray Hill Library and a regular speaker during public comment, said she appreciated the Finance Committee’s effort following the amendment approval.
Council member Michael Corrigan said he wouldn’t approve a budget that didn’t have hours restored, with several other members voicing similar concerns.
Before Lee’s amendment, Council member Kevin Hyde said he would meet with library officials to further discuss the issue. He’ll now be part of a subcommittee with Lee to meet at 1:30 p.m. today with library officials for the first discussion.
The committee approved the amendment unanimously.
Another amendment by Finance Chair Daniel Davis was tentatively approved that would make the library’s executive director report directly to the mayor’s office and Council instead of the library’s board.
In other news from the budget hearings:
• Following the morning session, Hyde also pitched the idea of allocating $100,000 more to Cornerstone, the economic development marketing arm of the Jacksonville Regional Chamber of Commerce, to strengthen its goal of luring more companies and jobs. Hyde said after talking with Cornerstone officials, the figure would make a tangible difference in what the organization could accomplish. Cornerstone would currently be funded $200,000 in the next fiscal year. Members agreed in principle but wanted more details on how the money would be spent.
• During the afternoon session, Davis led a discussion about travel and training, saying it was his mission to reduce such spending as much as possible without affecting mandatory or public safety spending. He discussed allocating travel funds to just the mayor, Council president and sheriff, requiring departments to ask each for travel funds. He also advocated for more online training to reduce travel expenses.
• After making a request last week, the Finance Committee and Council member John Crescimbeni, who is not on the committee but attended the first two hearing, received a list of City employees who received raises over the last fiscal year. The lengthy list was discussed with Chad Poppell, City Human Resources chief, who explained that the overwhelming majority – 95 to 96 percent – were part of contractual obligations that came with service time, promotions or equity clauses. The equity clauses, Poppell explained, trigger when an employee is hired off the street for more money than their peers make. The clause bumps up older employees’ salary levels to the levels of the newest hire. Several Council members expressed surprise with the clause, which Poppell said has been around for years. The list will be further analyzed for future meetings.
• The Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Department’s budget received an additional $337,000 in part-time salaries to fund the Cadet Program.
The next regularly scheduled Finance budget hearing starts at 8:30 a.m. Thursday.
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