The one percent increase in the city’s hotel tax made it through tonight’s city-county council with just enough support to make it bi-partisan.

All but one Republican voted “yes” and all but one Democrat voted “no.”

Republican Christine Scales voted against the proposal, Jackie Nytes voted in favor.

Libertarian Ed Coleman joined the Democrats.

Nytes said she voted for the measure because the city had no choice.  Scales opposed the measure for almost the same reason, saying she didn’t like the fact the Legislature left the Council with no other options.

You can hear both interviews below.

Both women also agreed the Capital Improvement Board is going to get a lot more scrutiny than in previous years.

Now that the tax has passed, it makes the city eligible for millions in loans and other revenue to cover the operational costs of the CIB.

Speaking of which, the CIB approved its budget resolution earlier today.  It did not include $15 million for the operation costs of Conseco Fieldhouse.

Jackie Nytes

Christine Scales

Note:  Tomorrow I plan to put the events of today into political perspective.  I think you will find it interesting.

Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard had a short presser tonight after his budget address.  An angry voter showed up and interrupted the event.   You can hear the whole thing here.

Mayor and angry voter

I can understand voter frustration, but listening to him reminds me how little people understand about how government is financed and how projects are paid for.  It really demonstrates elected officials need to spend a lot more time with their constituents.

The Capital Improvement Board approved a budget resolution today that eliminates most of its budget deficit, grant funding for Black Expo, the Arts and the Sports Corporation and includes no money for taking over the operation of Conseco Field House from the Indiana Pacers.

However, that budget includes funding that depends on the City-County Council passing tonight a one-percent increase in the hotel tax.  If not CIB members say they will have to make more cuts, cancel more conventions and layoff employees.

The total budget is $$94 million, $63 million in operational expenses and $31 million in debt service.  There is no money for capital projects and officials had to dip into more than $3 million of cash reserves to close the gap, which is still slightly more than $100,000 in the hole.

The Council is expected to vote on the hotel tax tonight, however it’s passage is still in doubt at this hour.  If the vote doesn’t pass the CIB will have to make more than $20 million in additional cuts.  Right now the situation between Democrats and Republicans can be defined, as one source put it, as “a staring contest to see who blinks first.”

Below is some audio from today’s meeting…

Bob Grand

Pat Early

Ann Lathrup

You can follow tonight’s CCC meeting on my Twitter feed.

There are two important events this afternoon with the Capital Improvement Board.

First, the CIB meets this afternoon.  If my memory serves me correct they will go over their budget.  There has been some questions about how they have narrowed their funding gap down to $5 million.   From what I was able to gather over the weekend, the renegotiated contracts and made some adjustments in their utility usage.  I’ll know more this afternoon.

Second, the City-County Council votes tonight on whether to raise the hotel tax one-percent, which would make the CIB eligible for state assistance.  Right now , the number of votes is still at about 10.  The big question will be to see how, if any, Democrats get on board.  Word is that Democratic  County Chairman Ed Treacy has instructed his caucus to vote “no”  however I also hear Democrats are getting pressure from unions and their business interests to vote in favor.  I frankly think this will be a game of political chicken tonight, so I’ll be watching to vote tally closely.

Finally, I’m doing some legal research this afternoon, thank God for that law degree, on what happens if the whole thing goes south and can the city legally give the keys to Lucas Oil and the Convention Center back to the State and what if the State says “no.”  Someone has to be the grown up in the room.

Already my research has found that the Pacers don’t get an automatic $50 million payment if they terminate the lease early on Conseco.  They would pay a penalty, but it’s based on a complicated formula and could not be more than $50 million.  It’s amazing what happens when you actually start reading an agreement.

Stay tuned.  I’ll be blogging and Twittering  throughout the day.

For the second year in a row, the Ballard administration says it will present the taxpayers with a budget Monday night that is balanced, increases funding for public safety, takes advantage of available federal stimulus dollars and leaves the city with a $50 million surplus in 2012.

In a briefing with media this afternoon, City Controller Dave Reynolds says much of they did was accomplished by holding the line on spending and asking all city-county non-public safety agencies to cut their budgets by five-percent.  The city did the same thing last year.  Reynolds says they did not micromanage the different agencies, but if they could not meet the five-percent goal they were asked to justify why.

Some of the highlights include the following…

• The budget goes from $1.2 billion to $1.22 billion.
• The city started the budget cycle with a $40 million funding gap.  $30 million came from tax caps, $10 million from declining revenue.
• Public safety spending was increased overall from $397 million to $431 million.
• Criminal Justice spending (i.e. prosecutor, courts) went from $200 million to $209 million.
• City agency spending went from $363 million to $325 million.
• Executive branch spending went from $87 million to $89 million.
• There is a five percent raise for police and city union employees, however 25% of those raises will come from their respective agencies.
• The city will take in about $60 million in federal stimulus dollars which will be added to already existing projects.
• The city will use stimulus dollars to hire 50 new police officers and use a grant from the Criminal Justice Institute to equip them.
• Township residents in non-consolidated fire departments will no longer see their portion of the public safety tax go into IFD, instead it will just go into the other public safety departments.
• The city saved $2 million by eliminating the township assessors offices and will save another $300,000 next year once the former assessors are no longer paid a portion of their former salaries.
• There is a $9 million increase in property taxes to service debt on a bond floated by the Peterson administration to pay for police pensions, however because of tax caps, no residential home owner will ever pay more than one-percent of their home’s value.
• Reynolds says since coming into office, they’ve managed to cut about $65 million from the budget since taking office.

In addition, the Peterson adminstration predicted a $200 million budget deficit in 2012.  Under the Ballard plan, that deficit becomes a $50 million surplus.   Reynolds the city will have to keep a watchful eye on spending.   The full budget will be presented tomorrow night and the full council will vote on the budget on September 21.

And just so save everyone a lot of grief now, the Capital Improvement Board is not part of the City-County portion of the budget.  It is a separate entity like the Airport and Library.

For the people in denial that panhandling is not a problem in Indianapolis, I may want to point you to some recent data I’ve come across.

According to IMPD, there were a total of 139 panhandling arrests in Indianapolis in 2008.    So far, in 2009, that number is 124.

In 2008, most of the panhandling arrests were confined to the downtown. However in 2009, there is an sharp increase in the number of arrests that take place outside the downtown area.   I noticed a number of arrests near Interstates such as I-465 and Allisonville Road, 465 and Meridian, I-65 and Raymond, 89th and Keystone, 45th and Lafayette.

In the downtown area a majority of the arrests take place on Pennsylvania, between Market and Washington.  On Meridian between the Circle and South Street and on Illinois between Washington and Georgia.

The fact that this city has reached 90-percent of last year’s panhandling arrests and it’s only August tells me that this is a serious issue, because no one is arrested for just holding a sign begging for change to feed their alcohol habit.  People are arrested for getting aggressive and intimidating passersby.

The anti-panhandling ordinance, which I have no problem with amendments for clarity and to not encroach on private property rights, is necessary so that citizens of Indianapolis can enjoy the quality of life they pay for either while walking downtown or getting on or off the Interstate.

Just Added:

Here is some audio from Friday’s news conference with CCC members Paul Bateman and Bill Oliver on the panhandling ordinance.

Oliver and Bateman

I get to spend today working on wedding stuff (less than 30 days away) as well as try to grade 300 pages worth of MBA Business Law final exams so I bring you another day of tidbits for you to discuss.

Big Ten

• After spending a week or so making calls and doing some checking I’ve concluded there are about 10 sure votes on the City-County Council to raise the hotel tax one-percent.   I’ll be watching over the weekend to see if any other votes show up on the board.   Right now, it’s not looking very likely.

Williams for Mayor?

• Once again, I can say I told you so.  Local venture capitalist Brian Williams has filed to run for Mayor in the 2011 Democratic primary.   I told you back in December to watch for Williams to get into the race.

None of the Above

• Speaking of Mayor’s race, I’m hearing from reliable sources that the current crop of Mayoral candidates (Kennedy, Hogsett, Tew, Meyers) have not lit the fire of the party establishment and many of them want an outsider with no baggage.

IPS-Union Deal

• IPS teachers are expected to meet over at Arsenal Tech this afternoon to get the details of a new contract offer from the school district.  No details are There has been some chatter that the agreement would make changes in how the District deals with seniority.

That’s all I got today folks.   I’ll have more on Sunday after the budget briefing.

I’m not really in a blogging mood today, but still feel a need to post.   So I’ll just open it up to you guys today to chat about whatever is on your minds; the President’s visit to Indiana, the upcoming Council vote on the CIB, the Wishard referendum, the city’s response to flooding, etc.   Only one rule, play nice.   If something news worthy breaks today, I’ll either post here or on my Twitter feed.

Ever since being regulated to the minority, my Democratic friends on the City-County Council have been looking for an issue they think will resonate with voters and help put them back in the majority.

One of those issues they’re latching onto is the Capital Improvement Board bailout.  A vote is scheduled for Monday on increasing the hotel tax 1% which would allow the city to access millions of dollars which would address part of the funding shortfall.

And while this problem was caused by a Democratic Mayor and Democratic CIB Chairman and Democratic-appointed CIB who negotiated away the revenue stream for Lucas Oil Stadium to the Colts,  Democrats are saying they want no part of this solution.   And while they did offer a plan months ago to help address the shortfall, their plan did not include any contribution by the Pacers,  who are owned by the Simons,  who are also big Democratic contributors.

From what I’ve been able to gather, my Democratic friends want the Republicans to carry the burden alone of the CIB tax increase so the County party can put out a news release which reads “REPUBLICANS PASS TWELVE-PERCENT INCREASE IN THE HOTEL TAX.”  The logic being that turnabout is fair play because when Democrats raised the County Option Income Tax .65%, it was labelled as a 65-percent tax increase.   The Democrats hope to ding the GOP on taxes, because their arguments against the anti-panhandling ordinance, also scheduled for a Monday vote,  are falling flat since a woman got carjacked by a panhandler at the I-65 and Keystone exit ramp.

Their CIB plan would be a fine strategy, except it doesn’t work.  First, the COIT increase came at a time property taxes were going through the roof.   Second, the hotel tax is paid primarily by people outside of Indianapolis.  Third, it’s a little  late for some of my Democratic friends to be finding Jesus on taxes, because when they had the opportunity to vote to lower the COIT and return to the taxpayers a portion of their money, half the Democratic caucus voted “no.”   I could go on with more examples, but I think I proved my point.

Now I don’t blame my Democratic friends for giving this a shot, after all this is politics and you look for your victories where you can.  However, trying to get a majority of voters to get mad over a tax that many of them will never pay just seems like a rather odd strategy to engage in when your wins are so few and far between.

Although it won’t be made public until next Monday,  Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard says his administration expects to present a balanced budget.

The city was facing a $20 million spending gap, which Ballard says his office has managed to close by doing “common sense business practices that should have been done a long time ago.”

The Mayor says they have also started replenishing the public works fleet and incorporated better accounting methods.

Ballard also says it will be a budget that both Republicans and Democrats will be pleased with.

Last year the city faced a $26 million shortfall in its $1.13 billion, but still managed to have money left over in the bank.

The budget will be formally presented at Monday night’s  City-County Council meeting.