The job cuts will reduce the city's workforce by 23 percent from 2002 levels.
Despite cuts to the police departments, community policing will remain a top priority, according to a series of memos prepared for city commissioners.
It will be up to police administrators to figure out how to do that with fewer officers.
In the fire department, no firehouses will close, but two fire companies will disband. That plan could involve combining two engine and ladder companies. The department also is considering limiting responses to nonlife-threatening medical calls.
Public safety will still be a priority, but fewer officers will probably mean longer response times, and perhaps even the same "limited responses" being considered by the fire department. A massive reorganization of city departments is underway, with the number being cut from 24 to 15, and remaining employees being asked to take up some of the slack. While streamlining and condensing isn't necessarily a bad thing, you can almost guarantee that doing business with the city will become more time consuming for citizens as these employees are asked to carry more responsibility.
And here comes the kicker - your "taxes" will go up anyway, as the city asks residents in various ways for more money to fund operations.
Along with layoffs, city commissioners will be asked to approve a measure that would reduce personal and dependent tax exemptions from $750 to $600 per person.
The change would cost a resident family of four just less than $8 a year, and a nonresident family of four just less than $4 per year. Grand Rapids would collect a little more than $400,000 each year in new revenue.
Residents also may have to pay for streets lights. City officials are considering taking the service out of the general-fund budget and assessing residents based on the frontage of their property.
Most people would pay between $25 and $48 dollars per year to light the street in front of their houses.
Neighborhood groups are already calling for higher taxes to save police and fire fighters.
At their meeting Monday night, members of the West Grand Neighborhood Organization said they are worried about the loss of so many public safety employees, and some are even willing to pay higher taxes if that's what it will take to feel safe in the city.
"We all understand the city doesn't have the money," says Steketee. "It's got to come from somewhere."
"It's going to cost more to live here if you want to continue to have the things we have enjoyed to this point," agreed Grand Rapids firefighter Casey Speilmacher. "We need some additional funding from the citizens. A tax increase or whatever you want to call it."
And they may get their wish, as the police officers' union is in the early planning stages of considering a public safety millage to put before the voters.
Police and fire union leaders said Thursday they are expecting layoffs among their ranks, and the top police representative said officers are exploring whether a public-safety tax is feasible to restore jobs.
Mike Bishop and the Senate Republicans may crow about how they have refused to raise taxes, but all they have done is pass the buck down to local city leaders across the state. You will pay, one way or the other, and I will hazard a guess that you will start to see things like this all over Michigan as cities scramble to fill the holes created by the Bishop-Dillon budget and their own drop in tax collection. Or, you can just do without the local police and fire department, but your insurance company probably will have something to say about that - so you might as well just pay the taxes and get it over with.
The Senate Republicans may have dodged their responsibility to the citizens of this state, but you are going to receive the bill anyway. Something to keep in mind the next time the teabaggers and campaigning "conservative" politicians yell for "more tax cuts!"