Budgeting As Fantasy, InsolvenCity-Style

The Ravenstahl administration has proposed a 2011 budget that immediately tests reason in two respects:

• It assumes the black hole of pension funding will be solved kicked down the road pointlessly for a year or two by The Great InsolvenCity Parking Garage Sale


• It envisions no major tax increase and no major service decrease

In other words, one more year of fantasy in avoiding a formal recognition of bankruptcy -- or any serious step to correct the problem. Instead, the city will follow its unsustainable trajectory by maintaining its lifestyle, making minimum payments on the credit card and hoping it can pawn enough to scrape together those minimum payments.

This development suggests rumors that this might be Mayor Ravenstahl's final term -- by choice, if not by verdict or consent decree -- might have substance.

Infinonytune: Fantasy, Earth, Wind and Fire