Some Light Weekend Reading: City Manager Manager's Proposed FY 2010-11 Budget

Moments ago, the city posted to its website the proposed budget City Manager Mary Suhm will discuss with the council at 9 a.m. Monday. It's not a detailed breakdown by any stretch, but a terse, bullet-pointed 53-page summation of what we've known for months was coming -- from the 450 "civilian layoffs" at City Hall that came down today to the deep cuts throughout the Dallas Public Library system, Park and Recreation Department and Office of Cultural Affairs to the significant reductions in traffic operations and street maintenance. And city employees will now be asked to take eight furlough days -- five date-specific, three floating.

For the second year in a row, your trash bill will come down -- from $20.34 to $20.25 -- but your water bill will go up 3.1 percent. And there will be new fees added and increases to existing ones: "multi-family registration, garage sale, coin-operated amusement machine, certificate of occupancy validation fees," per Page 12. There remain on the table as well other revenue-generating options, including the Transportation User Fee.

Suhm does not propose a tax hike. But she does tell the council what will need to be done should it choose to go in that direction.

Oh. And speaking of new fees, I see the Transportation and Environment Committee will yet again take up community gardens on Tuesday. They're up to their sixth proposal now. This one says it will cost $215 for a permit to plant. Only, you can't sell what you grow. That seems fair.