Start with the mayor. Agreed, the library kerfuffle wasn't a profile in decisiveness. And while there could have been more community meetings dealing with the first billion-dollar deficit, Nutter is more than making up for that in outreach efforts to address the second billion.
His cuts so far have been on the discretionary-spending side - about 40 percent of the budget. Next up is the nondiscretionary part.
For any savings there, the mayor will have to convince the city's unions of the seriousness of the financial situation. It won't be easy. Nutter's opening bid was dismissed as "insulting" by John J. McNesby, president of the city's Fraternal Order of Police local.
Among the changes the mayor seeks, as posted on the FOP's Web site: no pay raises over the four years of the contract; more flexibility on overtime rules; eight paid holidays instead of 12 (losing Columbus Day, Presidents Day, Veterans Day and employee birthdays); and higher employee contributions to pensions, increased from 5 percent to 8 percent. Nutter also wants unspecified reforms of health benefits.
The mayor is on the right track, especially in seeking savings in health and pension benefits. Last year, a report titled "Philadelphia's Quiet Crisis," by the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Economy League of Greater Philadelphia, detailed the need to address the cost of employee benefits. Among the findings:
The number of pension recipients exceeds the number of city workers (33,907 vs. 28,701 in 2006).
The growth of pension costs will eventually outpace that of city revenues. (Pensions cost $252 million in 1998; they are expected to cost $613 million in 2012.)
City employees contribute less to their pension funds than their counterparts in other cities.
Three of the four city unions don't require employee contributions to health insurance.
