Mayor Barrett signs 2014 Milwaukee city budget Thursday

MILWAUKEE (WITI) -- Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett signed the 2014 City Budget Thursday, November 7th -- a plan that invests in neighborhoods hit hard by foreclosures, allocates money for new neighborhood libraries, hires 120 police officers, and increases funds to improve roadways through the high-impact street program.

Mayor Barrett signed the budget in an empty Sherman Park home to underscore the impact of the foreclosure crisis on Milwaukee.

"Right now, our inventory of homes that the city owns is north of 1250 homes," said Barrett.

The budget includes a key provision spending nearly $12 million on foreclosure.

"We felt we had to take some pretty definitive and some what dramatic steps for us to be even more engaged.  We have been engaged.   But we thought we had to turn it up another notch, because what happens is, you can see if there is one foreclosed home on a block,  it might be an annoyance, if there's two it's perturbing, but beyond that, it starts having a ripple effect on other homes in the neighborhood," said Barrett.

The money will pay for the demolition of some 300 blighted homes and the same of 350 in 2014. That's about 100 more than the city would have been able to without the focused funding.

The mayor said spending money fixing foreclosures could also help shore up future budgets.

"We don't want to see a deterioration of the property tax base in the city," said Barrett.

The overall plan calls for spending $1.4 billion -- $54 million less than last year.  With a 1.4 percent increase in the tax levy, the average residential property will see taxes and fees rise $16.94.

The mayor’s original proposal to hire 100 police officers next year was amended by the Council to increase that number to 120, 50 of which will be deployed in summer 2014.

The budget includes a significant financial commitment to neighborhood libraries.  Funds are included to initiate replacement of both Forest Home Library and Mill Road Library, and the budget also includes funding for a renovation of Tippecanoe Library.

The budget includes infrastructure investments in bridges, streets, and lighting.  It supports economic development efforts at Century City and the Reed Street Yards, and it includes health department initiatives to reduce infant mortality.