Councilor: Gas Prices Put $4 Million Dent In Indy Budget

INDIANAPOLIS -- Rising gas prices are causing families to adjust their budgets and adopt conservation to cope, and Indianapolis is examining doing the same, only on a much larger scale.

The city, running far into the red on fuel expenses, is weighing several options to cut consumption and expense, 6News' Norman Cox reported.

"We're projected by September to be approximately $4 million upside down just on fuel costs alone," said City-County Councilor Benjamin Hunter. "Approximately from January to April, we've spent $2.4 million. The city's feeling the crunch in the budget just like everybody else at home is feeling the crunch."

Hunter formed a bipartisan committee from the council and Mayor Greg Ballard's administration to find ways to save. One of the first ideas that came up in the discussion is removing take-home cars from police, civilian employees or both.

Hunter contends that taking back police cars is a bad idea, and most officers agree.

"I think take-home cars serve a positive purpose by way of they do deter crime," said Indianapolis Metro police Detective Brian Dixon. "For those officers who are assigned to different positions, they need their take-home cars to respond to call outs."

Fraternal Order of Police President Bill Owensby said he is urging officers to save fuel and thinks considerable savings could be achieved by thinking about the way officers go about their duties each day.

"There's a lot of habits that they maybe have gotten in to that they could maybe change to reduce gas consumption, like idling on runs, that kind of thing," Owensby said.

Hunter said that another possibility to deal with the growing crisis is issuing a surcharge on the salaries of people who use take-home cars. Owensby said the FOP might be willing to discuss that option, but only as a last resort after other measures have been tried.