Despite the inclusion of higher fees and tax rates, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett's new budget will feature cuts in nearly every city department.

In his speech to the Common Council on Sept. 27, Barrett attributed the proposed budget cuts to the rising costs for fuel and health care, a freeze in state aid and new state-imposed limits on tax increases.

If the budget is accepted by the Common Council, it will likely mean fewer city services at a higher cost to city residents.

Fifth District Alderman James Bohl Jr. said the budget was tough to create last year and didn't get any easier this year.

"There were many difficult decisions," he said.

Most of the more difficult decisions Barrett faced involved determining which programs the city should continue to fund and which it could afford to drop, according to Bohl.

He said the problem "is the city's inability to find resources that other large cities receive, because of restrictions from the state government."

Bohl likened the mayor's efforts to cut spending to someone "trying to keep the city afloat when there is a lot of water around."

Yet new initiatives have room to grow amid the budget cuts. The mayor's proposal will allow for the creation of the Office of Sustainability, which will work with the mayor's Green Team to help guide the city's environmental policy.

The budget will also allow increased spending on public safety, something the mayor called his "top priority" during his budget speech.

According to the budget, the Milwaukee Police Department will be allowed to add two recruit classes and will receive $1.5 million more for their overtime budget than last year.

Also, the Milwaukee Fire Department will receive its 12th medical unit, part of what the mayor called "a continued commitment to making (Milwaukee's) fire department a first rate responder."

Alderman Bohl said his favorite aspect of the budget proposal was the mayor's decision to replicate Baltimore's CitiStat program.

Barrett's version of the CitiStat program is called the Accountability in Management Initiative, and it will help define the performance targets of city departments.

This should allow Barrett to, as he said in his budget speech, "oversee city operations, manage results and deliver excellent customer services for the citizens of Milwaukee."

While many city-sponsored programs are losing funding, Alderman Bohl pointed out that some sacrifices are necessary for progress to be achieved.

"People want taxes to be lowered but services to be augmented or increased," he said. "It just doesn't work that way. The only position worse than being an alderman reacting to a difficult budget is being the mayor and having to put a difficult budget together."

This article was published in The Marquette Tribune on October 4, 2005.