Parks Tacoma, the parks and recreation district in the city, is dealing with less money coming in than they expected and more costs to pay for. That led the organization to lay off staff, pause hiring for open positions and ask some staff to leave voluntarily last month.
The decision to let go of staff was made before the board had begun a budget amendment process, meaning there was little communication to the public that workers might lose their jobs.
“How quickly this happened is something I would hope to never happen again,” said Matthew Mauer, who is vice president of the park board of commissioners.
Mauer said that the layoff decision even appeared quick to some members of the board. It’s the authority of the Parks Tacoma executive director to make layoff decisions, and Mauer said the executive director made the decision that staff needed to be laid off before the budget amendment process began.
This, Mauer said, was to ensure that Parks Tacoma could continue running its programs.
Mauer said he has full faith in the decision that was made, but he wished that there had been more time to inform the community of what was happening.
Lower returns on property taxes, higher insurance rates and higher prices on things like sports equipment have all put Parks Tacoma in a budget deficit. Plus, some federal grants the district uses were paused.
The district had a reserve of over 20% at the end of 2023, which they planned to draw down from. But, after drawing down from that to pay for planned expenses, the district had a smaller reserve to use when expenses rose and revenue declined.
“In all honesty, we were overextended,” Mauer said.
Now, as the board works to amend the budget, Mauer said he thinks there will be some changes made to programming to ensure the district is running more efficiently.
Parks Tacoma is also considering taking out a line of credit. It would be a non-revolving line of credit not exceeding $10.5 million. Non-revolving means that the district cannot borrow any more than that amount, even if they have begun repayment.
Mauer said the district plans to use part of these funds to pay for the separation packages to the staff who were laid off.
The park board will decide whether or not to take out the line of credit at their regular meeting on Oct. 27.
