Dispute over community group funding continues with Park Ridge mayor’s veto

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Updated: March 24, 2012 8:41AM

Attending his first City Council meeting since hip replacement surgery last month, Mayor David Schmidt on Feb. 20 vetoed the most recent payments made to three community organizations.

Schmidt vetoed the City Council’s Feb. 6 approval of $24,750 in city funds to the Center of Concern, $2,970 to Maine Center for Mental Health and $3,168 to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital’s Meals on Wheels program. The funds represented the second- and third-quarter payments to the organizations for the 2011-12 fiscal year.

“It is wrong to compel taxpayers to support any private entity, no matter how well-meaning the group, unless that group is providing an essential city service which the city cannot,” Schmidt said, reading a prepared statement.

In October, Schmidt vetoed the first quarterly payment to the organizations, stating that city funds need to be set aside for “essential city services.” That veto was later overruled by a majority of the City Council.

A total of $61,776 was allocated in the 2011-12 budget for distribution to the three organizations. Schmidt had vetoed that expenditure last year, but it, too, was overruled.