merrill loma park improvements club. i have a question for the administrator. you mentioned in your budget presentation that our city expenses are increasing a lot faster than our revenues, more significantly. could you identify the main cause of the main expense lines going up and that is responsible for that situation? thank you. >> again, i think there are many pressures that the city is facing. about half of our expenditures, just so you know, are spent on salaries and benefits for our city employees. and we're seeing significant pressures in that area. our employees have not taken raisins -- races for the most part in several years now and have actually taken pay cuts. however, as all of your very well aware, health benefit costs for our employees continue to rise at a quick pace, and our pension costs continue to rise. again, because of the downturn in the economy that the city is now having to deal with. our pension fund is still sort of reeling from the impacts of the downturn and the hit to our benefit trust from a few years ago. so benefits are one of

merrill loma park improvements club. i have a question for the administrator. you mentioned in your budget presentation that our city expenses are increasing a lot faster than our revenues, more significantly. could you identify the main cause of the main expense lines going up and that is responsible for that situation? thank you. >> again,