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Friday, February 11, 2011

Snow Ruining City Budget


Following the Finance Commitee meeting on Wednesday and last night's acceptace of the report at the Board of Alderman meeting, it seems that the biggest issue the City's budget faces is falling from the sky. An original increase in the DPW's snow removal allocation from $300,000 to $500,000 is covering what Mother Nature is providing. Currently, the city is hovering around the million dollar mark getting rid of all the snow that has fallen across Somerville. Hopefully, the warm-up meteorologists are predicting for the rest of February is true...which would help the DPW immensely.

Other overtime overages were explained during Wednesday's meeting as department heads cited pending hirings to handle Fire Department and Emergency 911 Police budget increases that are putting them over the 50% cap for this time of year.

One of the biggest expeditures that the city has surrounds healthcare as Somerville is self-insured. A quick overview, however, revealed that they are currently under their predicted budget cap by over $800,000.

Somerville is not out of the clear, though, as many city officials are predicting a "horrendous" budget season due to drastic cuts by the State.

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