Nutter prepares Philadelphia budget

Mayor Michael Nutter will present his budget officially to Philadelphia City Council Thursday. But there are some indications of what the spending plan will offer.

Nutter said the city isn’t as bad off as in the past few years, but is far from being over the fiscal hump.

“Based on the current estimates and actual receipts coming in, things have kind of stabilized from where we were and have been since the summer of 2008,” he said.

The mayor said he still has to spend cautiously.

“We are anticipating that we are going to invest in the police department and try to have a class to graduate in the course of the current calendar year,” he said.

Nutter said he is sure his budget plan will be amended.

“Whether it’s the city budget, the state budget or the federal budget that gets introduced, it gets changed through the course of the process,” he said. “That’s just the way government works.”

The mayor said cuts on the state and federal level could force him to contribute to those changes by chopping parts of his own proposal.