PRYOR CREEK, Okla. — The Pryor Creek City Council spent all of the night of Sept. 23 discussing possible budget cuts for the 2024-25 fiscal year, as well as a potential voluntary severance for city workers.
At 12:02 a.m. Tuesday, the council voted 5-2 to pass the budget as amended during the meeting.
- Previous coverage >>> Pryor Police Chief concerned about city budget shortfall
Pryor's budget is already a month past an original deadline so councilors discussed each and every expected expense Monday night to try to bring expenses down from almost $9 million to $8.2 million.
The only item on the agenda besides the budget is Mayor Zac Doyle's proposal for giving $20,000 in a voluntary severance. This would apply to one employee in each of the city's six departments who voluntarily leaves their job by Oct. 1. The open posts would not be filled.
The severance vote was switched Monday night to be decided on after the budget vote instead of before, and was passed 6-1.
Paul Stevens, who serves on the Pryor Library Board, told 2 News Monday evening he worries for how these cuts affect providing for the community.
"We'll lose one member if one of our full-times (leaves)," Stevens said. "That puts us down to five employees. We'll have to reduce hours, all that. It's not good. It's just not good."
"We are top heavy in the payroll," Mayor Doyle said during the meeting. "And so, rather than come in and say we're going to lay everyone off, we're gonna do layoffs - we're going to leave it to the employee. It's voluntary."
Doyle added that if anyone who voluntarily leaves their post for the severance but wants to be hired back in the future, they'd have to be entry-level.
"We all inherited a mess. Pryor's no different than any other community in Oklahoma," Mayor Doyle told 2 News Tuesday. He the city had no choice but to cut costs.
"We're resilient. Pryor will come back from what we have," the mayor said. But right now, we've got to look and assess our budget just like everybody else."
There was also concern that first responders will have much less work with. Chief Jeremy Cantrell told the council the proposed cuts to the police department will strain his small staff with overtime.
"It's hard to move forward when you're cutting personnel," Chief Cantrell told 2 News Tuesday.
While he's not happy, the chief doesn't believe the move was done to intentionally defund the police.
"Most of the council is clear-headed and they're truly trying to get out of a crunch," Cantrell said. "Unfortunately, when you're the largest draw on that general fund as far as the overall budget, I get where they're coming from."
Both Mayor Doyle and Chief Cantrell started their positions in May 2023. Shortly after they began, Councilor Lori Bradshaw started at her post. She agreed that the seven-hour meeting Monday and its results were necessary, and she looks forward to the future.
"We're going to have to watch things closely, but we feel like maybe the budget that we passed last night will be budget-neutral by the end of our fiscal year," Bradshaw said.
Click here for our original reporting on this issue.
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