What’s in your budget?

Do you have a household budget? Do you manage a budget where you work? Either way, or both, it’s not always an easy task and it becomes more complicated when there is a larger number of people, or more money, or both, are involved.

Mayor Mufi Hannemann submitted Honolulu’s 2009 budget to the City Council. In short, more spending, no new taxes. Yet.

One feature of the budget reveals what may become a future election issue. It’s what the Mayor calls “post-employment benefits.” He also calls it a “nagging concern.” Post employment benefits are expenses the city must pay each year for retirees in the form of pension and health requirements. In short, the city pays people to retire, stay retired, and stay healthy while they’re retired.

Does your company do that?

Budgets are interesting reading. The 2009 city budget has a few hundred million dollars earmarked for the proposed fixed rail mass transit system, but barely 25-percent of that amount to work on current roads. Almost $100-million goes for the aforementioned ‘post employment benefits.’ There’s almost $16-million for parks improvements on Oahu, and almost $7-million for the Honolulu Zoo’s new elephant facility.

It would be interesting to know how many people visit the elephant facility each year and what it costs to run the facility. I’m not saying we should not have or pay for elephants in the zoo. After all, taxpayer money goes to pay for dinosaurs who run the government.