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Regular City Council Meeting Monday,July 8, 2013 Page 25 sence eliminate the merit pay program and essentially give staff a pay cut. While the intent of the City Council may be to put a policy in place moving forward, Ms. Bacon noted that the message sent to staff was that the City Council was enacting a pay cut. Based on the previous action tonight to increase the Fire Relief Association pen- sion program, Councilmember McGehee opined that she had no intention of tak- ing any action that would cut staff pay. While respecting Ms. Bacon's perspective about a pay cut and the theory behind it, Councilmember Laliberte opined that this was already happening in those de- partments not utilizing the current merit system. Councilmember Laliberte sug- gested additional training or a process to better utilize that program; and if not, a different solution was needed. Councilmember Laliberte concurred that any fu- ture implementation or amount couldn't happen due to restrictions coming for- ward in the budget process; and that the proposal needed to be part of those bigger budget conversations. Councilmember Laliberte supported having a policy with a range, while recognizing that 100% would be difficult to achieve, since once set- ting the bar, the City would be out of compliance; and also noted the need to ad- dress parity or union and non-union groups and the timing of those situations. Councilmember Laliberte expressed appreciation for the aspiration to achieve eq- uity among everyone; however, she noted the need to be realistic in having a poli- cy with goals that could be delivered. Mayor Roe noted if a range was set that equaled the current situation, it resulted in a cut, but if it was set and funded, it helped with the issue. Mayor Roe advised that he could understand the point of view to fund the recommendations now through use of reserves and later backfilling it with levy increases. However, Mayor Roe noted that future decisions on levy increases were subjective; and im- plementation could not be immediately achieved, automatically setting the City up for failure. Mayor Roe opined that, if the City wanted to set a policy, it needed to figure out a way to fund it immediately and how to work that into future budg- ets and levies. Mayor Roe opined that he was not comfortable doing that tonight; and from his perspective the broader picture was needed over the next 2-3 years, addressing other impacts on the levy (e.g. decertification of TIF Districts; 2015 contractual costs; CIP implications already set up, etc.) and to take all those things into ac- count. Mayor Roe noted how this was accomplished when putting together fund- ing for immediate and long-term CIP needs with operational costs reduced as part of the funding. Mayor Roe opined that all of these considerations entered into the picture. Mayor Roe opined that he was fine with setting a policy to provide a range; how- ever, he opined that a pitfall of having a range is that actual achievement may be