With this in mind, the city council voted 4-1 to approve a new revenue enhancement options ad-hoc committee at a council meeting on May 18. Councilwoman Ann Waltonsmith was the lone dissenting voice.

King and Councilman Nick Streit make up the ad-hoc committee.

"We've done everything to strip out anything we could," King said. "We're barely surviving and I don't see any major turnaround in the immediate future."

The mayor says that she is looking for out-of-the-box ideas.

"I want to talk to businesses to see where we can get more creative. Something has to change; otherwise our roads will get worse and our infrastructure will continue to suffer from lack of maintenance," she said.

Once a few options have been identified, the committee will make a recommendation to the city council, followed by a survey of residents' opinions. The staff report for the proposal indicates that the survey will cost between $20,000 and $30,000. The city proposes to fund this survey with money taken from the council contingency fund.

Vice Mayor Norman Kline said that every revenue option should be explored. "It's not that we have a lot of options. The process should be pretty quick," he said.

Waltonsmith said that she voted against the item because of the way it was structured. "I'm all for revenue enhancement. We have a sub-group that is going to go out and give us ideas. We should have had a general discussion before doing the specific work," she said. "This is like the tail wagging the dog."

Waltonsmith said that the ad-hoc committee should aim to educate the public. "We can upset a lot of people by making fast decisions."