It's not as big as Chicago's, but leaders in Illinois' second-largest city are taking steps to close their own budget shortfall.
Members of Aurora's city council voted last night to continue collecting a one-percent sales tax on groceries that the state says it will no longer collect starting in January.
The vote came after city Chief Financial Officer Stacey Peterson explained that the council would have "tough decisions to make in the future" to close a projected budget deficit of $29.7 million.
Peterson and others explained that the shortfall was being caused in part by the cost of programs launched with COVID-19 relief money that needed to be maintained, even though that revenue stream has expired.
"They weren't one-time expenditures," Peterson said, citing body-worn cameras for police officers and improved information technology resources. "They were expenditures that the city will have to continue into future years."
Mayor John Laesch told council members before the vote that turning down the 1% tax on groceries would grow the budget shortfall by more than $4 million ... and that more significant cuts would have to be made.
"Maybe we'll reduce a million dollars ... going after people's coffee funds and reducing the number of cellphones and computers and laptops and things like that," he said, stressing that the city can't resort to smaller cuts to close the shortfall.
Council members voted 7-5 in favor of the tax, with one alderman suggesting that it could later be repealed if property tax revenues went up in the future.
