City Hall's Great Salary Purge
Mayor Byron Phelps fulfills a campaign pledge by slashing the city payroll, cutting departments, and abolishing offices to save over $34,000 annually.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The new administration last night kept one of its most important pledges to the citizens, and in one session accomplished what its predecessors failed to do in two years. A salary retrenchment ordinance was passed whose result will be to save the city $27,000 a year. This, together with the offices abolished by the amendments to the charter, will bring the saving up to $34,370. The mayor also recommended a thorough revision of the salary roll, including reducing the police force to 51 men. One effect of the ordinance is to abolish the office of assistant corporation counsel.
“I have the honor to recommend for your immediate consideration a thorough revision of the salary roll of this municipality, the lopping off of every position not absolutely essential to the conduct of affairs.”
In 1894, Seattle was gripped by an economic depression that forced radical cuts to the city's administrative budget. Today, the debate over municipal funding often echoes this same tension between maintaining essential services and the political pressure to demonstrate fiscal austerity in lean times.
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