Rolley Weighs in on Mayor's Budget

(UPDATED 3:22 p.m.) — Although hasn't officially announced his bid for mayor, it's all but a forgone conclusion that the former city planning director will take a run at his adopted hometown's top job.

After Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake presented her  to the Baltimore City Board of Estimates on Wednesday, Rolley talked to reporters about what was presented.

The preliminary budget includes a 1.1 percent increase increase in spending in the operating budget, but slashes the capital budget by more than 40 percent. The mayor has called the plan "tough but smart" in the way it closes a projected $65 million deficit.

Here's a more in-depth look at what Rolley said beyond the soundbites:

On the budget:

"All things considered, obviously the only information I've really gotten is today at the Board of Estimates, but it's a point of concern for me because I really feel like the budget does not address the two main substantive issues that Baltimore is dealing with. And that is a lack of growth on the population side and the lack of jobs on the economic development side.

"I didn't hear anything today that addresses those two issues. And when you hear the lack of attention to those two issues, and the fact that they're cutting services that directly affects the middle class in Baltimore, the one part of the population we need to grow—it's a point of concern. I did not hear any reform and I didn't hear any substantive change except for change for the worse. So the status quo, I think, is dangerous for Baltimore. We're the only city on the Northeast corridor not to grow and this budget did nothing to address that fact." 

The economy:

"There's a lot of ways we can deal with our economy. One of those ways of doing that is not to put all our eggs in one basket. It's not just about real estate development and building up Baltimore. You have to have a diverse economy and a diverse municipal economy.

"There was nothing in this budget that talked about focusing inattention. They said in rhetoric 'we have to look at small businesses,' but it's more than that. And I think the people of Baltimore and the businesses of Baltimore get that. So if we're serious about building up our economy and our diversifying it, then you start to change your economic development agencies to focus in on key sectors, which I talk about, obviously, on my website, and I'm going to be talking about as I go to communities and business groups—focusing in on key sectors where you can build, build business, build opportunity and create jobs. 

"Putting all our eggs just in real estate doesn't work. It hasn't worked over the last 35 years. It should be one sector within our economy that we're growing, but not the only one. They mentioned in the Power Point that property taxes ... are not growing and they're kind of getting stagnant and income taxes isn't growing because of the high unemployment rate, but they mention nothing about how they're going to deal with that unemployment.

"I think the way you deal with it is focusing in our limited resources on small starter businesses in key sectors, diverse sectors, in terms of green manufacturing, in terms of our port, in terms of the retail, kind of commercial neighborhood level retail, our technology sector and computer services. There's an opportunity beyond to create jobs at different levels if we're willing to do it. And this budget doesn't show this current administration is willing or able to do that."

On service cuts:

"It continues to be an assault on the middle class and on the neighborhoods. I mean, Baltimore is a sum of its parts and the parts are our neighborhoods. And until the administration understands that you can only grow the city by investing wisely in those neighborhoods, we're going to continue to decline. So I was disappointed in the cuts in services. Because the services they're talking about cutting are directly impacting the individuals who are paying the bulk of their share and keeping Baltimore afloat. And we want to do more than float. We really want to sail. I didn't hear any of that today.

"So cutting library hours, particularly in this economy, bothers me. Cutting in terms of maintenance, cutting in terms of dead animal pickup within our community, it's like, 'if I'm paying twice that in property tax of any other jurisdiction, how do you continue to cut my services and expect people to move into the city?' So it was frustrating to hear, but it was more of the same. It was the status quo with our budget."

On finding additional revenues:

"As I mentioned a little earlier, the way you go about doing it is investing in business and investing in your neighborhoods. You look for a return on investment over the long haul. Doing budgeting on a year-to-year basis of 'I'm going to fill this gap and not that one' and then coming the next year to another deficit doesn't deal with the structural deficit of the city. So I've been having honest conversations in neighborhoods, and business groups and in churches, anybody who will listen to me, to talk about looking over the long haul. Obviously I'm a planner, but I've also been an implementer. So I get it. If we're going to fix it, it has to be [over the] long haul. 

"So part of it is around tax reduction, but not just tax reduction for tax reduction sake. But tax reduction is about investing in key business sectors. It's about investing in our neighborhoods in the right way. They took pride in the fact that they are maintaining the status quo in terms of the investment in education system. And, first of all, it's not completely honest because last year there was a $2 million cut, and they said there was the same level of funding when there was not. The schools had to pick up on their crossing guards, and so that impacted their ability to get done some of the things they needed to get done.

"But if you're serious about growing the city, then you invest where you need to invest. And that's around education, and it's around small and mid-sized businesses, and it's picking key sectors—the Baltimore Work Force Investment Board has given us a report. SEIU did a report called 'Putting Baltimore to Work' and the comprehensive master plan that my agency, while I was planning director of ... talked about the key sectors you invest in. They did not make any of those key investments.

"You do those things, you start to see growth. Does it happen overnight? No. But you start a process that helps to build the city up. And continuing to cut is really lazy economics and it's not leading."