Letter to the editor
The Gainesville City budget for fiscal year 2026, up for first hearing on Wednesday by the City Commission, reflects ten years of increases that can’t all be explained by inflation, loss of GRU money, or population. Spending just keeps growing. A lot. For 10 years nonstop.
In her budget message, City Manager Cynthia Curry blames the loss of GRU transfer money for “a number of Draconian revenue reductions.” The bigger problem is more like the saying, “When everything’s a priority, nothing’s a priority.” The budget expansion parallels increasing disarray in City government since November 2015, when that City Commission decided that their City Managers no longer needed experience in actually running cities and still would get more pay and benefits than those who did. The current commission just approved another interim City Manager with no city management experience…