On Thursday, Phoenix City Councilman Sal DiCiccio complained that the City of Phoenix had wasted $16 million in “just one day.” The week before, DiCiccio had expressed concern about the structural deficit the City is facing.
DiCiccio argued that the deficit problems would continue until leaders made public safety a priority and cut spending in non-essential areas.
Earlier in the week, Councilman Valenzuela bragged of the drop in the unemployment rate, and rise in median household income in Phoenix. However, Phoenix is currently one of the least recession recovered cities in the country.
On that same day, City staff gave a presentation which showed that the deficit continue to grow.
In a statement released Thursday, DiCiccio reported that he voted against the following expenses, all of which the Phoenix City Council ultimately approved:
- $3,668,564 to Downtown Phoenix Inc. – a group that already taxes private businesses against their will to spend money on the Downtown area.
- $16,000 to National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials – annual membership fee.
- $60,000 to Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA) Local 777 to buy promotional and training material for themselves.
- $108,000 to Ballard Spahr LLP- lobbyists (this is on top of the hundreds of thousands of dollars they already spent on lobbyists at the last council meeting).
- $12,170,000 to extend bus hours and change three routes.
- $750,000 to join the ASU Global Institute of Sustainability.
TOTAL: $16,772,564
“During just a single city council meeting, we could have cut $16 million of unnecessary spending. Instead, we continued to add to the structural deficit problems we face,” stated DiCiccio. “As long as we continue to spend in this manner, we will continue to see taxpayer monies wasted, and city officials will continue to have their hand out, saying they need to increase taxes because they are short on revenues. They’re not. They just have a spending problem.”