Woodstock budget cuts coming - NIMBY

The Woodstock City Council held a special City Council meeting on January 15 to discuss the City's budget planning. After a lengthy discussion, which is recited in the Minutes for the meeting (which can be viewed on the City's website at www.woodstockil.gov), Mayor Brian Sager gave his views.

From the Minutes:

"He stated that it is important for City Council to establish a goal of a certain percentage reduction overall. It is his opinion that this figure should be 5% overall, with some items less and some more.

"Personnel -
1) Do not eliminate or reduce Council pay."

For the recorder of the meeting Minutes to list no pay cut for the City Council, #1 must have been the first point made. I'm not sure whether the mayor should get a Hero badge for putting that item first or if it would have been worse to recommend all the other cuts and then say, "But don't cut our pay."

Certainly, the mayor and the City Council members are not getting rich from the compensation for their elected positions, but shouldn't they take a hit on their pay, just like everyone else is going to?

It's not that the dollar amount of any reduction would be worth talking about for very long, but there is a principle involved.

In all fairness to the members of the City Council, I did not read through the entire Minutes to learn whether any Council member suggested that they should take a pay cut, if they are going to slice into employees' pay.