Lorain Council pushes budget to March session

LORAIN — City Council moved this year's permanent budget to a second reading, pushing the ordinance closer to its March deadline. Council must pass a permanent balanced budget by the end of next month as required by state law. Monday's meeting saw the 2025 budget fail to garner enough votes to suspend the three-reading rule, automatically moving it to a second reading. Voting against the suspension were Sylvia DuVall, D-at large; Angel Arroyo Jr., D-6th Ward; and Josh Thornsberry, D-8th Ward. Arroyo, who previously served on Council from 2016 to 2020, was reappointed Sunday to serve out the remainder of Antonio Baez's term. Arroyo is running to retain the seat in this year's general election, where he will face Republican Aaron Knapp. Dan Nutt, D-4th Ward and the chair of Council's Finance and Claims Committee, said he was not ecstatic with where the budget was, but recognized the holes between projected revenue and expenses often lessen as the year goes on. Currently, the city's proposed budget projects $45.2 million in expenses for the general fund and about $41.9 million in revenue, with carryover from 2024 making up the difference. Mayor Jack Bradley reminded Council the budget is "a living document" that his administration plans to revisit throughout the year — and lauded the cuts in expenses and bump in revenue from when Council passed the temporary budget in December. That temporary document projected expenses for the year at $46 million and revenue at about $38 million. Auditor Joe Koziura said the current budget has no new positions appropriate in it. "The budget is theoretically balanced, but I've already told you the future is very scary," he said. Mary Springowski, D-at large, shared his concerns. She suggested instituting a hiring freeze and consider not filling vacated positions. She compared it to a family's budget — when one job does not bring in enough money to pay the bills, someone may get a second job to make ends meet. That second job for Lorain should be economic development to bring in more revenue, she said. Tony Dimacchia, D-at large, said the budget was no surprise and while he shared concerns over the budget, he said decisions made by prior Councils to provide pay raises for police, firefighters and other city workers were necessary to retain and recruit good people. He referenced a letter from Kathryn Kennedy read into the record, which highlighted that 78 percent of the city's 2022 budget went to personnel costs and cutting that by 8 percent would save the city about $3.1 million per year; while slashing it down to 50 percent of the city's total costs would provide another $10.7 million per year. "She's not far off," Dimacchia said. "She understands the numbers, and so do we all." As the discussion around the budget flowed to the state of streets in several wards, Jayne Morales, of Lorain, commented from the audience that city officials "gave yourself raises," sparking a brief back-and-forth between fellow audience member Tia Hilton of Amherst Township and Council President Joel Arredondo. After Morales' comment, Hilton followed it with "We have an attorney as a mayor, that's the problem, people." Arredondo's response was to tell her to "Oh please, be quiet" after asking her if she would like to leave. Later in the meeting he asked her to be civil after she started an exchange between fellow audience member Aaron Knapp. Contact Carissa Woytach at (440) 329-7245 or cwoytach@chroniclet.com.