City budget cuts reach bare bones

The city of Atlanta will cut another 222 jobs and temporarily close a fire station and several recreation centers as it wrestles an expected revenue shortfall of at least $50 million, Mayor Shirley Franklin said Tuesday.

“We are now cutting into what we believe is the bone,” Franklin said. The latest efforts are expected to save the city nearly $14 million.

No police officers and firefighters will be laid off but critics fear public safety will be compromised.

The new round of job losses, the third this year, will begin in mid-December. The city laid off 372 of its 4,400 general fund employees in two cuts earlier this year to fill a $140 million budget shortfall. It also slashed most city workers’ weekly hours and pay by 10 percent, beginning later this month.

Nearly half of the latest cuts will come in the Parks, Recreation and Cultural Affairs Department, city officials said.

Fire Chief Kelvin Cochran said beginning Christmas Day, the city will close Fire Station 23, located at 1545 Howell Mill Road, and shut down Fire Truck 12, which operates from Fire Station 12, located at 1288 DeKalb Ave. Cochran called the cuts “blackouts,” and said they would last at least until June 30, the end of the city’s budget year.

Although the mayor said city spending is down by 2 percent since July 1, revenues are down nearly 13 percent. Franklin blamed the financial crisis on the deepening economic slump that has cut into the city’s sales and property taxes and permit revenues.

Cochran said the fire department blackouts are based on call volume and other factors. The chief said other fire response teams will be asked to pick up the slack, but he conceded that response times to emergencies may be slower in the neighborhoods impacted.

Residents who live near Fire Station 23, located near Berkeley Park, were dismayed by Tuesday’s announcement.

“I don’t want it shut down,” said Tammy Hermida, 50, who moved to the neighborhood from East Cobb a year ago. “I understand the economy is bad right now, but this is safety. It’s about the safety of the neighborhood.”

Hermida’s neighbor, Philip Massey, was part of an effort in 1990 to save the station from closing when the city was trying to cut costs.

“Don’t take our fire station,” said Massey, 89, who’s lived in Berkeley Park since 1959. “I like it. I think it’s good protection for us.”

The city will keep 11 of its 33 recreation centers open.

About a dozen centers slated for shutdown are already closed for renovations or other reasons. Among currently open centers to be closed are the Central, Dunbar, English Park, City of Refuge, Lang Carson, Oakland and Thomasville.

The department’s commissioner, Dianne Harnell Cohen, said recreation officials looked at “geographic equity” in deciding which centers to close. No part of Atlanta, she said, would be left without a recreation center.

Officials didn’t want to close any centers, she said, “but we have no control over what the national economy is.”

“It is a very, very sad day for us,” Cohen said.

The rec centers will still be available for special events, officials said. The city will re-evaluate the centers’ status before adopting the next budget in June 2009.

Franklin said other cost-cutting will include reducing recycling pickups from once a week to once every other week. Franklin will also cut one-fifth of the city’s permitting staff, citing a decline in permitting activity.

Starting Dec. 12, City Hall and City Hall East, the current police and fire department headquarters, will be closed to the public on Fridays. Residents who want to pay their water bills at City Hall will still be able to do so.

The city believes it can generate $12 million a year if state lawmakers next year approve several measures on its wish list.

Atlanta is not alone in feeling the bite of the economic downturn.

Some metro Atlanta governments are slicing programming as they struggle with falling revenues. The crisis has paralyzed the construction industry, put tradesmen out of work, stalled zoning and development requests and limited government revenues from building licenses, permits and inspections.

While city leaders have announced another round of layoffs, no similar actions are planned for Atlanta Public Schools.

A city government’s money comes from a combination of local tax dollars and revenue sources, such as building permits and other fees. Local property taxes pay for most of Atlanta schools’ nearly $662 million general fund budget. The school system also gets some state and federal money.

The Atlanta district has closed schools with declining enrollments to save money, including Waters Elementary in southeast Atlanta and Walden Middle in the Old Fourth Ward at the end of last school year.

Staff writers D.L. Bennett, Mark Davis and Laura Diamond contributed to this article.