Terre Haute's Sakbun on budget cuts, redistricting, energy costs

In this week’s installment of Ask The Mayor, Terre Haute Mayor Brandon Sakbun addresses this issue and more at City Hall. Listen to the full conversation with Indiana Newsdesk anchor Joe Hren by clicking on the play button above, or read some of the questions and answers below. A portion of this segment airs 6:45 and 8:45 a.m. Wednesday on WFIU. Here are some highlights.

This conversation has been edited for clarity and conciseness.

Hren: Bloomington looks like another deficit with their budget going into 2026. Columbus Mayor Mary Ferdon told me that the city is going to dip into their reserves. A press release just came out from your office about budget concerns too?

Sakbun: We have a modified hiring freeze. I think it's in total, six departments in the city of Terre Haute have consolidated in terms of staff have retired. So we've consolidated their duties and responsibilities to other members of the office. We have purchased equipment and technology to make our staff as efficient as possible. So that combined with additional gaming revenue. And we had a good growth year.

If you look at the city of Terre Haute parks budget, so the amount is almost the exact same as 18 years ago. So they are being asked to do more with less for almost two decades now, and that's definitely created some issues.

I think we'll be in a very good position for 2026-2027 and 2028 when things will get a little bit murky, is the economic development income tax, and public safety local income tax go away, and cities are forced to adopt their own local option income tax, because those numbers, what we can adopt versus what we're going to lose, are not the same.

Whitney Downard

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Indiana Capital Chronicle

Hren: Any thoughts on the potential efforts for redistricting in Indiana after the Vice President's visit last week?

Sakbun: Here's the thing, if the legislator so chooses to call special session about redistricting, personally, I'll be a little bit frustrated and here's a couple of reasons why. We have absentee landlords and out of town investors that just absolutely ravage our Hoosier communities, buying up properties, getting the same tax break as Hoosier investors and Hoosier land owners. When are we going to introduce legislation to address these California and Florida negligent landlords and hold them accountable.

Why can't we address the fact that utility bills continue to go up double digits from private utility companies? I mean, we need to start having conversations about the actual kitchen table issues that folks love to talk about going into November of an election year. But when the election happens and it's over with, it's like, poof. I want to know how the state can do a better job of supporting public safety. They brag about these public safety budgets, but counties are being forced to tax their constituents to build these jails, and all of a sudden we found 1000 beds for migrants. I mean, how?

Why are we not having conversations with local government saying, hey, I backed the blue, I'm going to make sure they get paid a livable wage. I just get so flustered, because why would we call a special session for that redistricting when our constituents have these problems, day in and day out. We need to work with our schools so they can prepare our students for the economy of the future. Let's talk about that instead of drawing arbitrary lines on a map to help out one side of the aisle or the other side in November of next year.

Hren: You wrote an op ed in the Indy Star a week or so ago saying electricity rates up 33% over the last decade, promoting help for those who need it, but also the current system isn't delivering to Hoosiers. Is that a bipartisan issue that can help Hoosiers?

Sakbun: I mean, it absolutely should be. Here's the issue. There has been federal policy that was passed through the Inflation Reduction Act that is helping homeowners modernize their homes with updated utilities. To lower these bills at the federal level, we need to support legislation like that at the state level and at the local level, we got to do a better job of having conversations with companies that come to the Hoosier State, understanding their electric needs, their water needs, their natural gas needs, and then planning to build a grid that supports the state for the future.

This is a conversation point that a lot of mayors have been screaming from the tops of roads the last few months, because when these folks, when they have an issue, they can't get a hold of the legislator. They can't just drive to Indianapolis to have a meeting. They come to us.

Some of the benefits that cities and towns were able to offer with state assistance, those aren't there anymore. And we're going to have to turn to the faith based community, the nonprofit community, because mayor's hands, a lot of times, have been tied, because these are private utilities, and a lot of these utilities, they are putting profits before people.

Hren: You were on social media about Terre Haute's 14th and Chestnut Community Center facing some financial uncertainty due to federal grant freezes. Can you explain what it is and what's next?

Sakbun: It's a community center that does after school program, does have faith based programming, does help with meals throughout the summer and during the school year. It's one of the many nonprofits that's lost funding.

We're working with a couple of other organizations to put on a professional development course for these nonprofits, to really train them and coach them towards fiscal sustainability. How can we work with these staffs to find private grants, to work on creating a donor base to be professional organizations that can work in the community to help their revenues increase so they can be financially independent to the best of their ability.

That's very hard to do in the nonprofit world. Look, folks, at the end of the day, it's the nonprofit world, not the for profit world. And so there are going to be challenges. Some of these decisions that are made at higher levels of government, they don't have to face these Hoosiers day in and day out, but the mayors we go out there, we fight to do the best job with what funding we get, and we're going to keep doing that.