Boston has a $48.4 million budget deficit that must be addressed this fiscal year which ends in June, city officials said this week.
The gap, driven in part by snow removal, overtime and soaring health care costs, represents about 1 percent of the city’s annual budget, according to Boston Chief Financial Officer Ashley Groffenberger. City officials may need to dip into reserves to cover the shortfall.
Groffenberger did not immediately answer specific questions about layoffs or whether the city plans to cut services to balance the budget. But the city has decided to tighten spending across departments to preserve core services like trash pickup and library hours, Groffenberger wrote in a letter to the city council…