BLOOMINGTON - The city may hold off hiring six police officers, stagger hiring nine firefighters and delay the opening of a new fire station. | Bloomington may cut up to 60 jobs | DATABASE: Bloomington employee salaries (FY 07-08) | Normal employee salaries not busting budget | DATABASE: Normal employee salaries (FY 07-08)

Even with those ideas, public safety was relatively untouched by cuts in a proposed $78 million city budget presented to the Bloomington City Council on Monday. The plan did include doubling garbage rates, cutting 40 to 60 jobs and merging five departments into two.

City Manager David Hales said the city would apply for a grant in which the federal government pays most of the salaries and benefits of new officers for their first three years on the job. That could give the city enough time to recover financially from its budget woes to take over the funding, Hales added.

Hales said the city needs about $624,000 for the officers for the coming fiscal year. The first-year costs of paying, equipping and training one Bloomington police officer is about $100,000.

"Hopefully, we will know before we finalize the budget if we are going to get the grant money," Hales told the council during a budget workshop. If the grant is not approved, it's possible the six officers will not be replaced, Hales added.

Staggering the hiring of nine firefighters could save the city $500,000 in personnel costs.

Hales also proposed delaying the opening of Fire Station No. 5 until October. Station No. 5, under construction at Six Points Road and the proposed extension of the Mitsubishi Motorway, was scheduled to open in May.

He suggested hiring three firefighters in October, three in January and three in March.

The city also is building Station No. 6, under construction at Central Illinois Regional Airport.