Houston’s Democratic mayor has admitted that his city, the fourth largest in the U.S., is in millions of dollars worth of debt and cannot afford to pay for firefighters.
Mayor John Whitmire, elected after defeating Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee last year, sounded the alarm about his city’s money woes in a meeting.
As the city now faces a deficit of $160 million, Whitmireis proposes spending cuts and tax increases to tackle the massive damage done by his Democratic predecessors.
“I think we can all agree that we’re broke,” Whitmire admitted during a City Council meeting.
However, the mayor avoided taking the blame, adding, “It was broken when I got here.”
Whitmire recently settled a labor dispute with city firefighters, agreeing to give them “$650 million for seven years of back pay.”
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“I’m not going to play games with people’s lives,” Whitmire said.
“I’m not going to play politics with people’s lives. So we have a responsibility to settle with the firefighters and protect Houstonians.”
The mayor wants the city’s police and fire departments to keep their current funding but has proposed a 5 percent cut to all other areas of government in order to right the ship.
“I don’t like a 5 percent cut now, but you have to make tough decisions and the folks put me in this position to make tough decisions, and I’m going to do my job,” he said.
However, Councilwoman Tiffany Thomas wanted more than Whitmire’s solution, demanding a more robust plan.
“Are we going to fee Houstonians? Is it a trash fee?” Thomas asked.
“Are we paying for parking after 6? Are we going after Metro’s money? What are we doing?”
The mayor said one solution to save the city from bankruptcy would be to increase taxes.
Meanwhile, Councilman Willie Davis offered a blunt assessment on the issue.
“This is going to come down to a financial sacrifice by the city. Now we can either be $1.2 billion broke, or we can be $650 million broke,” he said.
It’s worth noting that Houston has only elected two Republican mayors in its history. That last served from 1978 to 1981.
Go figure.
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