Revenue loss predicted in Chattanooga's financial future

Revenue loss predicted in Chattanooga's financial future

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It might not be what it was supposed to be.

Governments at all levels are dealing with revenue shortfalls amid a pandemic economy.

Chattanooga is no different.

And today the public got to see for the first time, what the city's financial future may hold.

That's tonight's top local story.

It was supposed to be growth then came the covid-19 pandemic and destructive storms. now, chattanooga is grappling with shortcomings in an 8.4 million dollar reduction in projected revenue compared to last year.

Coo maura sullivan: "our unanticipated expenses are rising and our revenues from sales tax, fees and other taxes are declining, and it's budget time."

The mayor's administration presents a 2021 budget to city council members.

It's one with no tax increase, employee layoffs or salary cuts.

Coo maura sullivan: "the big reason that we're able to do this to present this type of budget to you, even though other cities across the country are facing large layoffs and property tax increases this year, it's because our city was in excellent fiscal health prior to this crisis."

But, the budget does reduce agency funding by 2 percent, freezes hiring and employee salaries and postpones ladder increases for fire and police officials for one year.

Coo maura sullivan: "challenging times call for hard choices and we've made the choices that were needed to balance our budget."

City officials are expecting all major sources of revenue to be down including state and local sales tax revenue.

Cfo daisy madison: "sales tax shows a loss of 6 million dollars or 8.9 percent due to the pandemic.

Our second largest source revenue we are suffering a 6 million dollar loss."

It's a budget proposal dealing with projected loss, like so many others all facing tough times across the u.s. chattanooga city council members are planning to dive deeper in specific areas of the proposed budget before taking a vote