Indy Mayor Seeks $85M For Crime-Fighting, Pensions
Funding Would Require Major Help From Legislature
Indy Channel (Indianapolis)
January 9, 2007
INDIANAPOLIS -- Indianapolis' mayor Tuesday night said he wants the state Legislature's help him find $85 million annually to pay for crime-fighting initiatives -- many of which already have been implemented -- and shore up public-safety pensions.
Mayor Bart Peterson said the city needs to find about $50 million annually to pay for his crime-fighting plan, which includes input from a task force that he established last year because of rising crime rates. He said the plan would:
- Increase police presence in neighborhoods and fund police overtime.
- Continue night court operations that began last year, and add prosecutors and public defenders.
- Keep in place hundreds of new jail beds that were leased last year.
- Eliminate a crime-lab backlog of firearms and ballistics tests.
- Dedicate money to support crime-prevention programs.
Peterson, while announcing the plan at the City-County Building, acknowledged that he implemented many of the measures last year -- following a well-publicized string of homicides in early August -- without having money for them in the city's budget.
"I made the conscious decision that, as we were in a war against crime, we had to do what it took to fight back and then find the necessary funding later," Peterson said. "I take the full and sole responsibility for that decision."
Some of the initiatives were aimed at reducing the crime rate by preventing early inmate releases caused by jail crowding. Peterson said that since Aug. 6 -- about the time that the measures were implemented -- the Marion County Jail hasn't had any early releases.
In the other part of the plan, the city would borrow $450 million to shore up unfunded portions of pensions for city police officers and firefighters, and then make debt payments of $35 million annually for 25 years.
Peterson said that the pensions of officers hired before 1977 are currently paid from the city's operating funds -- the same pool of money used to pay for public safety -- and that the practice needs to change.
"It doesn't take a budget expert to see that as we pay more for pensions each year, we have less to spend on policing our streets," Peterson said.
The city would need the state Legislature to allow it to borrow the money.
Indianapolis would need legislators' help in other ways. Peterson said that to raise the $85 million needed yearly ($50 million for crime-fighting initiatives and $35 million for paying off the loan that would be used to shore up the pensions), the city plans to lobby the Legislature to pass measures that would:
- Allow the city to consolidate township fire departments into the Indianapolis Fire Department. The city said the move would yield $15 million in savings annually.
- Let Indiana municipalities cut their reliance on property taxes and raise revenue through other options. This measure is called "Hometown Matters."
"We need the state's help -- not a handout," Peterson said in a news release before his speech. "We are simply asking for the authority to let us solve our own problems."
Peterson Also Seeks Property-Tax Relief
In a move that would not free money for his plan, but rather provide property-tax relief, Peterson said he wants have the state cover the growth of child-welfare expenses dating back to 2005. He said that would give Indianapolis taxpayers about $40 million in property-tax breaks yearly.
Peterson said that in 2005, key state government leaders, including Gov. Mitch Daniels and then-House Speaker Brian Bosma, advocated a state takeover of funding for the state's child welfare system, which currently is funded by local governments.
"If the state takes over just the growth in the fund from 2005 onward, our taxpayers will not only avoid future property tax increases, but will receive an immediate property tax break of nearly $40 million each year," Peterson said.
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