Provo backs away from city layoffs

PROVO — The Provo City Council is backing away from suggestions that the city consider employee layoffs or furloughs as a way to balance the fiscal 2010 budget.

Mayor Lewis K. Billings had asked that layoffs not be considered, but in a Tuesday council work session, Councilman Steve Turley asked that they be put back on the table.

Councilwoman Midge Johnson suggested the council look at furloughs as a way to meet shortages if they occur during the coming year. Councilman David Acheson agreed that furloughs could be a consideration.

On Thursday, Council Chairwoman Cynthia Dayton said neither idea will be considered. Turley and Johnson would need to present the ideas formally before the council as a whole would consider them, Dayton said, and neither plan to do so.

"Council leadership has discussed the matter of employee furloughs and/or layoffs with individual council members and determined that there is not a majority of support for forwarding any proposals regarding these options," Dayton and Council Vice Chairwoman Sherrie Hall Everett said in a joint statement.

— Rodger L. Hardy