Six months after her initial 100-day "State of the City" report, Mayor Carolyn Kirk is going back on the road this week.
Kirk is holding three neighborhood meetings — the first at 7 tonight at the American Legion building at the foot of Washington Street — to discuss progress on her reform agenda and take questions from residents. The second "state of the city update" meeting will be Wednesday in Annisquam Village Hall. The third meeting is scheduled for Oct. 21 at Magnolia Library. Both will start at 7 p.m.
Now nine months into her first term, Kirk has honed the city's concerns into a five-part agenda, which starts with continued fiscal management and ends with a new item, seemingly related to the teen pregnancy problem that emerged as a global fascination last spring.
Kirk listed her priorities as "relentless" fiscal management, infrastructure and the need for a "five-year fiscal plan, economic development, reforming the city's government and the new addition — "youth support and development."
Kirk said she would emphasize the limits of city resources.
"We can't accommodate every valid need," the mayor said.
The circuit comes with the mayor facing resistance to her economic development program on two fronts — the commitment to complete negotiations on a tax forgiveness deal with Gloucester Crossing developer Sam Park and his partner DeMoulas Supermarkets, and the proposal to rezone the Fort to allow for a hotel on the former Birds Eye Foods site.
Kirk will be reprising a communications initiative she used in April. On the 100th day of her mayoralty, Kirk made a lengthy presentation and lecture that laid out the city's detailed fiscal troubles and established the yardstick for measuring progress.
Since then, she has checked off as "done" initiatives aimed at closing the books from fiscal 2006 and 2007 and holding the line on deficit spending. The symbol of that commitment has been her hard line against budget-busting Fire Department overtime to keep Magnolia Fire Station open.
She conceded that the short priority list is a "nice way of saying 'no.'"
Kirk said remaining firm in that resolve was the key to bringing spending into line with the city's resources. In her state of the city address, Kirk predicted that this fiscal year would be transitional and that the city might be able to begin adding to the spending menu in fiscal 2010, which begins July 1.
But that hint of relief from the need to consolidate was made before the national and global banking system showed signs of unraveling.
She described her second priority, "infrastructure," as inseparable from fiscal management, saying, "we have to have a five-year capital plan."
Facing more than $100 million in mandated water and sewer projects, Kirk has been in continuing negotiations with federal and state environmental enforcers to form a program that the city can afford.
"My third priority is loosely described as economic development," Kirk said, "focused on the harbor and downtown. It involves Harbor Plan, redeveloping downtown and planning for when Gloucester Crossing opens its doors."
Park, who has signed DeMoulas to build a Market Basket as his project's anchor store and has turned to DeMoulas for development loans, is seeking a tax incentive financing deal that would forgive a portion of the new property taxes assessed to Gloucester Crossing.
Park has said the Market Basket supermarket could open next fall.
The Planning Board, working with City Council's Planning and Development Committee, meets Oct. 20 to continue working on the rezoning of the Fort. Many residents and representatives of Fort-based businesses have objected to the zoning plan, especially the aim to allow a hotel on the former Birds Eye site on Commercial Street.
The fourth priority, a "focus on reform," Kirk said, "is already underway." She said she was referring to the process of choosing a firm to undertake a $50,000 audit of the Police and Fire departments. She also noted that the insistence that overtime not be used to maintain station openings was a step in the reform of the Fire Department.
In an interview Kirk said the need to emphasize supporting the school age population was underscored by the surprising spike in pregnancies of high school students.
She said jobs, building on the past summer's jobs program, and a teen center are needed. She said, "I'd like to pull community leaders together to mentor our youth. I'd like to send a secret message to teenagers," said Kirk. "You have our attention."
Richard Gaines may be contacted at rgaines@gloucestertimes.com.
