Twenty-four city employees were notified this week that they will be losing their jobs at the end of the month.
The final layoff notices went out after the City Council approved a new two-year budget on Monday. The cuts were across several departments:
- Administrative Services – 2 positions (mail room assistant and financial analyst)
- Community Development – 2 positions (permit tech and senior planner)
- Court – 1 position (probation assistant)
- Parks and Rec – 9 positions (2 clerks, 2 recreation coordinators, 1 recreation leader and 4 recreation specialists)
- Police Department – 3 positions (1 police cadet and 2 police clerks)
- Public Works – 7 positions (1 civil engineer, 4 custodians, 1 mechanic and 1 project manager)
Another seven vacant positions will be eliminated.
The number of layoffs is far lower than originally anticipated. In September the city notified more than 100 employees, about a quarter the staff, that they could be laid off on Dec. 31. Most of those notices were rescinded this week.
While it is certainly regrettable that some good folks lost their jobs, there should have been more cuts in expenditures and less new taxes. While clerks and custodians do important jobs and are real people with real families, the layoffs didn’t address the gravity of the situation. Most, if not all, department heads projected devastation in their departments if the full cuts were made as originally suggested. The police chief suggested cutting the entire narcotics division and both animal control officers. Really? It now seems to me that these projections were more bluff and good theater than real intensions. And it worked. Taxes were raised on the citizens that cannot afford it while business at the city goes on pretty much as before.
The sending out of 100 layoff notices early in the game was mostly illusory and used to get what was needed, viz. higher taxes. While I appreciate that this process wasn’t easy and many worked long hours to compromise on a final budget, it now seems that the citizens are once again left holding the bag… and that bag now is costing us more of the money we don’t have…
I certainly feel sorry for the folks who were laid off during the week of Christmas but I also feel for those Lynnwood citizens who are a fixed income or have little or no income and will be paying higher taxes. This really hurt them.
I should note that I don’t have an axe to grind with the Lynnwood PD. They are awesome. Ditto on the Fire dept. But my feeling now is that there was more than could have been cut than 1 cadet and 2 clerks at LPD. The sacrifice is on us.
That sums it up in a nutshell. Go to the Parks and Recreation tab of the budget and take a look at the frivolous waste programs that we continue to fund. Things are supposedly so awful that we needed to raise taxes in what can only be described as an epic orgy of taxation, and we’re still paying for Lynnwood University, public art and a raft of other useless stuff.
I’m sure the laid-off workers will be delighted to know that we still have Show-and-Tell and new public art. Likewise the residents and businsses being called upon to fund that crap.
Merry Christmas, Lynnwood style. Thanks City Council!
Lynnwood, they are digging themselves a mighty big hole, no one wants to drive the streets there much less visit any merhcants, folks will drive out of their way to shop thanks to all the traffic cam traps.
heres an idea, if intersections are so dangerous around Lynnwood why not extend the duration of the yellow caution lamp and the lapse between the time it takes for the apposing intersection switch to green? as it sits my guess is some of the intersection intervals are bordering on illegal regarding state statutes on the length of yellow light and switch traffic lights durations.
oh wait thats right, red light cams aren’t really about traffic safety are they?
the city council could simply shorten the yellow light duration a little more to fill any budget pittfalls.