BROWN WANTS TO SAVE FOR RAINY DAY

The City's $100 million budget surplus will boost funding for Muni, parks,
child care and drug treatment on demand -- but most of the money will be
placed in reserve for a rainy day, Mayor Brown says.

"We're flush with cash," the mayor said Tuesday at his biweekly press
conference. "We only think it's going to get better, at least through my
re-election.

"We're going to hold on to it because we know it's not money that is
guaranteed," Brown said. "We will be prudent in how we use it."

Brown said he expected to present a budget for Board of Supervisors approval
that would include only a small percentage increase over last year's $3.4
billion spending plan.

Muni and the parks are the big winners in his proposed budget. Brown also
said child care and drug treatment on demand would be a high priority for
the 1998-99 fiscal year spending plan.

"We will be downsizing in other places in order to be able to use our monies
more appropriately for those purposes," Brown said.

"There will be money to bring the parks up to the standards that they once
happened to be in," he said. "A little of the money will go for that. And
there will be some money to go toward child care. But the bulk of that money
- -- more than $90 million -- will be held for prudent surplus."

While Brown did not go into detail about his overall budget, he did offer
some specifics about Muni, including criticizing the agency's abuse of
workers' compensation.

Brown said he would put a plan in place to control workers' comp and
possibly hire a private agency to monitor it.

Brown said some of the surplus money would go toward Muni improvements,
including 480 hires.

Andrew Sullivan, chairman of the riders advocacy group Muni Rescue,
applauded Brown, but said money wouldn't fix everything.

"It is really critical that the railway get the funding it needs," Sullivan
said, repeating Muni estimates that cutbacks during lean years had left the
transit agency with about a 10 percent hole in its equipment and personnel
budget.

However, he added, the mayor needs to roll up his sleeves and back changes
in hiring and promotion that Rescue Muni contends get in the way of filling
jobs and leaves Muni short of drivers.

"He needs to take the lead to change the civil service structure," Sullivan
said.

Those hiring and promotion rules, however, are the product of collective
bargaining between The City and the drivers' union, a close political ally
of the mayor.

"If he delivers," Sullivan said, "the mayor will boost the public's faith in
him in how he uses their tax dollars."

The public has remained critical of Brown's handling of Muni, which he
promised to improve in his first 100 days in office -- even promising to
drive the buses himself to make sure they were on time. Then, the mayor said
the system should be fixed by next May.

Tuesday, Brown told a reporter he would swap jobs with him if Muni did not
show improvement by May 1999, more than 1,000 days since he took office.

"I'm taking your job, and you've got mine," Brown joked.

Brown said it had taken a while to get new buses on line. In addition, Muni
hasn't had a full complement of personnel in a decade. Brown said by next
May that would no longer be an excuse.

Brown said he was looking at about $385,000 to add personnel to the parks
and recreation staff, particularly at The City's swimming pools.

He said money would be added to improve sections of Golden Gate Park damaged
by homeless dwellers.

Other park funds may go toward buying uniforms for park personnel and a ramp
at McLaren Lodge. Brown also would like to see The City's park Web site
improved. While the mayor took some credit for the budget surplus, he said a
dramatic increase in real estate values and tourist spending were the main
reasons for the windfall.

©1998 San Francisco Examiner