TX-Stop Bilingual Pay or Maintain Sanctuary City Status?????
More Difficult to Cut Taxpayer Funded Bilingual Stipend if the City of Houston wants to maintain their SANCTUARY CITY STATUS!

Latinos protest plan to stop Houston bilingual stipend
It's just 1 of 96 amendments as City Council works on budget shortfall
By BRADLEY OLSON
HOUSTON CHRONICLE
June 21, 2010, 11:50PM

City Councilwoman Anne Clutterbuck has proposed eliminating the city's practice of paying bilingual employees a $70 monthly stipend for their language skills, prompting staunch protests from the Latino community in the wake of national unrest over immigration and multicultural issues.

The proposal, one of 96 budget amendments proposed by council members, would save more than $1 million a year. Other proposals from council members run the gamut, from disputes with Mayor Annise Parker over how to spend council budgets to a request for showers in the council bathrooms.

So far, none has drawn as much attention as the dispute over bilingual pay, which more than 1,400 municipal employees receive.

Frumencio Reyes, a legal adviser to the Harris County Tejano Democrats, which organized a rally Monday at City Hall attended by various state legislators and activists, said the proposal was not in keeping with Houston's status as an international city.

"We take this as a personal affront, especially those of us that are sons and daughters of former immigrants to this country," he said. Reyes and others called on Clutterbuck, who represents District C, to drop the amendment.

"We're looking at a tight budget and are counting pennies to find savings everywhere we can," Clutterbuck said in a statement. "All of my budget amendments are designed to save the taxpayers money and that is what my constituents elected me to do."

An aide to Clutterbuck indicated she was open to a compromise if it meant the bilingual pay program would be more strictly overseen. The city has no data on the proficiency level of the 1,445 people who receive the $34.62 biweekly stipend, said Jonathan Newport, Clutterbuck's chief of staff. And she has concerns about people getting the pay who either don't need it to carry out their duties or have not had to prove their language ability, he said.

The Houston police and fire departments also provide bilingual pay, but those who receive it must pass a test, Newport said.

Parker said in a statement that she negotiated a substitute proposal with Clutterbuck that tries to apply stricter standards, although many of those standards already exist in the original executive order that created the pay system in 1992.

Council members have spent much of the past several months preparing for Wednesday, when they will meet with the mayor at City Hall for a marathon council session in which they consider and debate all the proposed amendments to the mayor's $4.1 billion budget. Parker has proposed closing an estimated $140 million shortfall using surplus funds, land sales, fee increases and spending cuts. Fiscal year 2011 begins July 1.

In a city where the mayor is notoriously powerful, controlling what can be placed on the council agenda, the annual budget amendment hearing is an opportunity for council members to propose and debate many of their own ideas about city policies and programs.

This year, many of the amendments focus on potential ways to save money, including making it harder in a tight budget year to add employees. Another attempts to undo the mayor's decision to limit the ability of council members to provide excess funds in their budgets to pet causes in the city, such as to benefit certain parks or help the Houston Police Department's Mounted Patrol Unit buy saddles.

District E Councilman Mike Sullivan, who proposed the most amendments of any council member with 39, has taken aim once again at SafeClear, former Mayor Bill White's towing program. He also has proposed delaying the 3 percent raises the city has promised to civilian employees, an item that would save an estimated $8.6 million.

"When we have as large a number of Houstonians out of work as we do, I think it's unconscionable to be giving pay raises to city employees," Sullivan said. "Here we are at the day of reckoning and we are not able to afford what this contract calls for."

bradley.olson@chron.com

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