Budgeting in Tough Economic Times

August 19, 2011 Public Sector Roundtable

Having just completing city budgets in some of the worst economic times in recent memory, members of the Ethics Center's Public Sector Roundtable gathered in August to share how they approached the difficult decisions they had to make. As one member put it, "The arithmetic is easy." The hard part is deciding between competing social goods. Participants—city councilmembers, mayors, city managers, and other public officials—generally agreed that eliminating "waste, fraud, and abuse" was insufficient in the face of today's economic challenges.

Leading the discussion were John Ellwood, professor of public policy at U.C.-Berkeley, and Sam Liccardo, city councilmember from San Jose

Judy Nadler, senior fellow in government ethics at the Ethics Center, moderated. Also in attendance were:
Jason Baker, Campbell
David Casas, Los Altos
Kansen Chu, San Jose
David Ginsborg , Santa Clara County
Kirk Hanson, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics
Michael Kasperzak, Mountain View
Bill Kelly, Santa Clara
Phil Kleinheinz, Santa Clara
Tom Manheim, San Jose
Jamie McLeod, Santa Clara
Raania Mohsen, Santa Clara County Cities Association
Pierluigi Oliverio, San Jose
LeeAnn Pelham, Los Angeles
Joe Pirzynski, Los Gatos
Alicia Rangel, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics
Tom Reese, S.J., Woodstock Theological Center, Georgetown University
Dan Rich, Mountain View
Nicky Santos, S.J., Markkula Center for Applied Ethics
Miriam Schulman, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics
Steve Tate, Morgan Hill
Jason Wu, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics