The Hunt Administration’s Budget Fiasco
The Evening Statesman launches a blistering critique of the city's fiscal mismanagement and the mysterious, unaudited expenses of the water department.
The Union suggests that the reason the city expenditures for the last fiscal year were $148,000 while receipts were only $134,000 was because the city treasurer used all money available to pay off city warrants. Yet the city warrant indebtedness was reduced during the last fiscal year only $3,354.54. If it had not been for the $17,000 left on hand by the Babcock administration, the Hunt administration would have come out $14,000 behind. There is no cause for boasting when an administration spends $14,000 more than annual revenues in the face of the highest tax rate in the history of the city. Furthermore, the water department disbursements are a sealed book; the water committee is authorized to expend two thousand dollars monthly, and it is no business of the inquisitive public how that money is spent.
“The itemized disbursements of the water department are a sealed book to taxpayers in general, as they are never audited in an open meeting of the council.”
Public oversight of municipal budgets remains a friction point in Walla Walla today. The paper’s demand for transparency in the 'water department' reflects the eternal struggle between administrative convenience and public accountability in local government.
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