SOUTH PORTLAND – South Portland would have fewer firefighters and police, snow removal services would be cut back, library services would be reduced, bus fares would go up, and the city would no longer provide waste disposal bags for dog owners at city parks and Willard Beach.

Those are just some of the city services that would be impacted under a preliminary 2010-2011 municipal budget proposal the City Council received Monday night.

Additional changes would include moving the city’s Planning Department from its rental offices on E Street to Hamlin School, located at Ocean and Sawyer streets, in order to save $45,000 in rent payments. City Manager James Gailey said the school department is planning to close Hamlin and move the alternative education program there to other schools.

The cutbacks in city services are necessary to make up for a loss of revenue without raising taxes, Gailey told the council.

“Over the past two years, we’ve lost $1.3 million in revenues in the city,” Gailey said. “And it really shows.”

The city will receive $215,000 less in state aid in the new budget year. Revenues are expected to go down in a variety of other categories too, including auto excise taxes – the city expects to get $300,000 less in the new fiscal year. The city also expects a $75,000 loss in investment income.

The proposal Gailey presented to the council Monday would be about $1.3 million less that the current $27.5 million municipal budget, he said.

The proposal is very preliminary. Councilors have not yet begun the formal process of deliberating on the new budget, which will take effect July 1. In fact, Gailey won’t be presenting his complete municipal budget proposal to the council until March 15.

However, a majority of councilors said last month that they wanted to see municipal and school budget proposals that reflected no tax increase or a minimal increase at best. City residents struggling in the economic recession can’t afford to pay more taxes, councilors said.

So Gailey on Monday presented a budget scenario that was just about $32,000 short of councilors’ request for a zero tax hike.

He is advocating using as much as $250,000 in city reserve funds to help make up for the budget gap. Still, his proposal would entail cuts of about $600,000.

It would eliminate 7.75 positions. Because of a hiring freeze he instituted last fall, the positions are already vacant so no one would be laid off, Gailey said.

Two firefighters positions would not be filled to save more than $96,000. That would leave just 12 firefighters covering days and 13 at nights, according to Fire Chief Kevin Guimond. “I don’t feel comfortable dropping below 13 (at night),” he said.

When firefighters are out sick or on ambulance calls, staffing will be stretched very thin, Guimond said. “We’ll get the job down for you, but it’s a lot more difficult,” he told the council.

A school fire prevention program for students in kindergarten and third grade would be eliminated to save $10,000. With the position cuts, the fire department would no longer have enough manpower to staff the program.

However, Councilor Tom Blake, a former city firefighter, suggested volunteers could take over the program.

Also, the Thornton Heights Call Company Engine 6 building would be closed and its staff moved to the Cash Corner Fire Station to save $7,500.

In the police department, one officer position and one detective position would not be filled to save more than $104,000.

A children’s librarian position would become a half-time one to save nearly $18,000 and a 10-hour branch library job would be eliminated to save more than $10,000. There would be a loss of hours in the children’s section of the library and the branch library as a result.

Also under the budget proposal, the city would save $8,000 by no longer providing waste bags for dog owners at Willard Beach and city parks.

The city would also save $20,000 by reducing the use of salt and its pre-treatment of winter roads.

The budget also calls for an increase in city bus fares to generate more than $13,000 in revenue. Tom Meyers, the city’s transportation director, said the fare would climb from $1.25 to $1.50 for adults, from $1 to $1.25 for students and from 60 cents to 75 cents for senior citizens.

Councilors on Monday said they needed to study the proposal more before making any decisions, but they gave preliminary reactions that were mixed. Several said they could reluctantly live with many of the proposals, but raised concerns about the impact of cutting police and firefighters and raising bus fares.

Councilor Rosemarie De Angelis suggested councilors give up their city-paid health insurance benefits to help restore some positions.

Mayor Tom Coward said he feared some cuts would hurt the city, and urged the council to consider at least a slight raise in taxes. “If we focus too much on the bottom line, we lose what makes South Portland South Portland,” he said.

He noted figures that Gailey presented showing that a 1 percent increase in taxes would cost a median home valued at $216,000 a total of $9.61 cents more on its annual tax bill, yet raise $170,454 to help address the budget gap. Coward said, “That would give us a little breathing space.”

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