By Howard Packowitz

BLOOMINGTON – Bloomington taxpayers will soon get monthly snapshots about the status of city finances.

The city’s finance director will provide updates during the council’s second meeting of every month, according to Tim Gleason, Bloomington’s new city manager.

Gleason said the increased transparency means there will be fewer surprises come budget time when the city council wrestles with difficult spending decisions.

“What we’ll do is we’ll identify what our current revenue and expenses are, see how we are compared to what the projected budget we are in currently, and then also (compare) where we were the same time the year prior,” said Gleason.

“When we talk about taxpayer dollars, I think the community deserves to know how we are tracking in the current fiscal year,” Gleason also said.

Prior to Gleason’s arrival, the city council raised fees, cut back on bulk waste pick-up, and made other spending reductions to overcome a budget deficit of almost $3 million.

Alderman David Sage says the council should have made even deeper spending cuts because the fiscal crunch will get even worse this coming year.

The council’s senior member, Karen Schmidt, is against raising taxes and fees to balance the budget. She announced she’s running for reelection next year. Sage is not running for reelection.

Howard Packowitz can be reached at [email protected]