This article written and submitted by City of Sedona staff.

Sedona AZ (April 13, 2010) – In order to respond to the continued decline in revenues and still be responsive to the Sedona City Council’s priorities, changes were made to staffing levels and organization of City Departments on Friday, April 9, 2010.

These changes are consistent with discussion at the January 27, 2010 Council meeting where staff proposed expenditure reductions across the General, Capital, and Wastewater Fund and informed Council of reorganization that would take place in spring 2010 to position the City for a balanced budget in FY 2010/11.

Achieving a balanced budget in FY 2010/11 and a stable budgetary position for the long-term and maintaining a reasonable level of service to the public required associated restructuring in the organization.

Restructuring involved several position title changes and movement of several existing positions and functional areas to subsets of existing departments. All existing frozen vacancies will be eliminated or restructured as part of the FY 2010/11 proposed budget.

The effective result of the reduction in force is the elimination of 7 full-time employees and one part-time employee. Last Friday’s layoff brings the total reduction of positions since June 2008 to 23.

The elimination of positions and employees affects every department across the City and reflects a 15.7% reduction in staffing levels in the past 24 months.

The budget savings for the 7.5 newly eliminated positions totals approximately $525,000 for next fiscal year. $1.2 million of non-personnel related expenditures were eliminated in January. The City will finalize its proposed FY 2010/11 budget in the next few weeks and budget workshops are scheduled to begin the first week of May.

For more information, please contact the City of Sedona Manager’s office at (928)
204-7127.

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