When your house is on fire, where the initial spark came from isn’t what matters.
Not right then. Not when the sirens are blaring.
In that moment, it’s about putting out the flames to contain the damage.
Well, right now, the city of Goldsboro’s financial house is ablaze.
And that is what City Council should be doing right now — using any fire house, extinguisher or anything else that can stop a full-on disaster.
Instead, some council members don’t seem to get it, while others appear content to watch the local government burn to get their “gotcha” moment and a chance to emerge from the ashes clinging to political power.
Here are some facts:
Earlier this month, the Local Government Commission told city leaders that it has serious concerns about Goldsboro’s finances.
Finance Director Catherine Gwynn shared the LGC’s concerns during the council’s budget work session Thursday.
The commission wants to know, in a nutshell, if now that the city has its 2019 audit — the public has still not been given a decent explanation about why the audit took so long to complete — how 2020, 2021 went and what city leaders need to do to make sure fiscal year 2022 is solvent.
“As you know, your General Fund and your Utility Fund are your two giants in the room,” Gwynn said. “So, they had a lot of concerns. They want to know, because their bondholders want to know, ‘How are you going to sustain yourself?’”
Then, she delivered perhaps the most important line uttered during the session.
“We have to look past, ‘Is it anybody’s fault?’ We have to look forward (to) how are we, as a group, pulling together to make sure that we keep Goldsboro growing, successful and viable financially.”
She’s absolutely right. Whatever political reckoning awaits those responsible for this mess isn’t today’s problem.
There is a fire to put out.
This is how we do it — a 3-cent tax increase and a 15-percent water rate hike.
We get it. Nobody likes tax increases. We don’t like tax increases. And yes, there are people out there who don’t have a whole lot of wiggle room in their bank accounts.
But it’s also true that Goldsboro hasn’t increased taxes in more than 15 years. And the LGC wants to see more money in the city’s General Fund — a lot more.
A tax increase is the only way, particularly after COVID-19, to inject a meaningful amount of cash into that coffer.
And anyone who thinks nit-picking and line-by-line elimination of small expenses will do it simply is not paying close enough attention.
Enter Councilwoman Brandi Matthews.
She went through the budget book line by line looking for places to cut. Not such a bad idea during a budget session.
The bottom line is that she is right. We should be looking for wasteful spending — before a thousand here and a thousand there turns into millions.
But we are past that.
And even if we weren’t, Matthews didn’t seem to recognize the difference between wasteful spending and cutting necessary expenditures you just don’t agree with.
The councilwoman proposed cutting funding for Friends of Seymour ($16,500), the Wayne County Chamber of Commerce ($20,000) and Military Affairs Committee memberships for members of the council ($3,100).
Not smart. Not if you are thinking about the city’s future.
Frankly, those three cuts would do more damage to Goldsboro than the not-even-$40,000 it would take to continue funding them.
What kind of message does it send to the business community and the Air Force that they collectively aren’t worth $40,000 from the city’s multi-million-dollar budget?
News flash: Like it or not, Seymour Johnson Air Force Base is the reason Goldsboro isn’t a ghost town. It brings hundreds of millions of dollars and thousands of airmen and their families into this community. Businesses are here because of the base and development is moving forward because of the base.
That is a need, not a waste.
But that said, Ms. Matthews is right to critique the decisions of past councils.
Longtime council members did “kick the can down the road” by not gradually increasing the tax rate.
But to be fair, there has not been a chorus of council members — including longtime Republican and Democrat leaders — calling for a tax hike.
No politician wants to be the one who votes for a tax increase. Ever.
And let’s face it, that is why no member of this council is jumping up and down to pass tax and water rate hikes — even the ones who understand it has to be done.
Would they have been the sole voices calling for an increase in years past? Not likely. They would have put that “no tax hike” on their campaign poster.
We got here because casting a vote like this is hard.
But that is what leaders do. They make the decision that corrects a mistake and safeguards the city’s future.
And they are not the only ones facing a decision like this. The Board of County Commissioners just had a similar vote.
It is worth noting that two former City Council members are now on that board and both Bevan Foster and Antonio Williams voted to approved a tax hike despite the can kicking that occurred before they took their seats.
Now is the time to right the ship in the interest of moving this community forward.
And the 15 percent water rate hike is equally as critical.
Here’s why — once again, out of the mouth of the professional the city hired to keep its financial house in order:
“I think it’s my job to ensure that I tell you that if you don’t pass some sort of rate increase, the fund is going to be insolvent in 2023, OK? I mean, insolvent. Can’t pay its bills,” Gwynn told the board. “ … I just want you to understand that if you don’t have that increase, that is a significant financial effect. I’m not trying to scare you, but I’m just trying to be upfront with you. You cannot go into fund balance because you’re not going to have any fund balance to go into.”
Read that again.
“You’re not going to have any fund balance to go into.”
But an empty Utility Fund — which, by itself, is catastrophic — isn’t the only consequence of inaction.
Without a water rate hike, there will likely be a moratorium on development.
For those who don’t know, that means no new housing developments will be approved and no new businesses could hook up to the city’s water system — crippling growth and guaranteeing, at best, a stagnant tax base.
How can anyone be confronted with those two realities and not approve this rate increase?
Is it unfortunate? Yes.
Should we, perhaps, be angry that we’re in this position? Absolutely.
Should we watch and scrutinize our elected officials to ensure this never happens again? Of course.
But this is not the time to play political games.
No bickering. No announcing that you aren’t running for re-election, so you don’t care what your fellow council members say. No forgetting that we all knew we had a utility crisis brewing, that it has been a topic of conversation for more than a decade.
Speak the truth. Say what you need to say. Call out hypocrisy if you need to. Challenge statements made about your leadership if you think it’s necessary.
Admit mistakes were made.
Then, get on with the business of taking care of your city — just like you promised the taxpayers you would.
Or, vote ‘no’ and be remembered as the board member who could have put out the fire, but let the city burn because the initial spark didn’t happen on your watch.
