Mayor's preview of the 2017 budget and state of the city address

Huntington Mayor Steve Williams presented, Tuesday, a preview of the city budget for the fiscal year 2017 and his state of the city address to the 414 journalism class. Students were able to question the mayor before he officially releases his budget proposal Wednesday.

Currently Huntington is facing a $5 million deficit. The mayor hopes to shrink that debt to a projected $122,000 after his proposal.

He began his speech with a reference to the America’s Best Communities contest Huntington has placed in.  

“If you’re going to be America’s Best Community, you have to be resilient,” said Williams. “It doesn’t mean that you don’t go through hard times.”

The deficit will be reduced by the recent termination of 24 fire and police employees, transferring of money between departments, freezing all nonessential money and hiring, eliminating the spring paving program and by using the “rainy day fund” held by the city, according to Williams.

Seventeen cuts were made to the police department and seven to the fire department in January. A majority of the dismissed employees were probationary officers hired between November and December 2016.

“If you’re going to be an effective leader, lay-offs are unavoidable,” said Williams. He called the process gut-wrenching and as the students continued to bring up the subject of the reduced forces, he stated that the number of force out on patrol is at a historical high. According to Williams, 72% of the deficit is employee-related and a large portion of money is spent in paying police and firemen overtime and pension.

“We can only have a government that we can afford,” said Williams.

The mayor noted that more than a million dollars will need to be moved around departments to compensate for a city-wide budget tightening. He plans on eliminating the spring paving program, but will keep the fall paving.

“It hasn’t hit us yet, but a snowfall will hit,” said Williams. “We need to be able to clean the streets and then fix the pot holes.”

The mayor also plans to use the city’s rainy day fund of approximately $2 million.

“If it’s a rainy day fund, we’re in the middle of a monsoon,” said Williams.

Williams said he plans on setting the stage at the address tomorrow for the livelihood of the city.

“Do we partner or do we take up arms and battle?” asked Williams. “If we battle, there will be causalities, including the standard of living in Huntington.”

He concluded his speech with a brief review of the four major aspects of the city’s revitalization plan in association with the ABC contest.

“We want to set a standard that others will seek to emulate,” said Williams.