Editorial: Put in your 2 cents' worth

New Orleans City Council members and officials in Mayor Ray Nagin's administration face difficult choices as they consider over the next few weeks how to plug a $68-million hole in next year's budget.

That means debating questions like what public services or functions to cut and by how much, and whether residents should pay more for some services, as the mayor proposes.

But officials are not the only ones with an opinion. Residents can make their voices heard in a series of public hearings council members will hold starting Monday at 9:30 a.m. in City Hall's council chambers.

The hearings are scheduled to last for several days, and a full listing is posted on the council's Web site at nolacitycouncil.com. The council is promising also to make live video of the sessions available on its Web site and to archive the videos there. The administration and council also should post the full proposed budget online so residents can thumb through it as well.

Trying to better organize the budget hearings, council members are changing the format this year. Instead of presentations from individual departments, the council set up "panel discussions" with officials from related agencies appearing together.

Monday's sessions, for example, will include a discussion on the city's pension systems. Tuesday will feature three panels on the courts and the criminal justice system, and Wednesday's panels will debate quality-of-life issues involving entities ranging from sanitation to the New Orleans Museum of Art. The new format may allow residents to offer their input regarding multiple agencies with common interests at one panel.

To the extent possible, residents should take advantage of this opportunity to let council members know how they would like to see their taxes and fees used. Council members asked residents to consider what public services they can do without -- and that's a good question, since a shortfall as large as the one New Orleans faces cannot be met without sacrifices.

Council members Stacy Head and Shelley Midura, for example, have suggested paring down the city's expensive trash collection contracts. This newspaper has been making a similar suggestion ever since Mayor Nagin inked the expensive deals after Hurricane Katrina. The contractors provide a good service, and residents seem happy with the results. But adding fees and taxes for the contracts, New Orleanians are spending much more than residents in unincorporated Jefferson Parish for what are essentially comparable levels of collection.

The mayor also has proposed across-the-board cuts in all city departments. But officials, and residents as well, must ask themselves whether that's the best way to reduce expenses.

After all, families trying to make due with less often make larger cuts in some areas -- traveling, for instance -- while preserving basic expenses like the mortgage or groceries.

The city inspector general's office made a similar point earlier this year, saying across-the-board cuts "may cripple a program that's doing high-priority work, without considering whether a lower-priority program might be cut altogether."

Admittedly, these are not the sort of questions that usually entice throngs of residents to attend a council meeting. But New Orleans' deficit is so large that even popular and important services may have to take a hit, meaning most residents will feel an impact one way or another.

Mayor Nagin, for example, is proposing increasing parking-meter hours and ticketing parked vehicles without valid brake tags, among other options, to collect more revenue.

Whether you support or oppose the proposals, attending the public hearings is a good way to let officials know.