ÌìÃÀÊÓƵ

Honolulu Mayor Peter Carlisle said he has long instructed his Cabinet to streamline operations, and he believes they “get it.”

“Within the first two weeks that I was here, people were instructed that they were to look toward efficiencies, look toward methods of cutting fat,” Carlisle said. “Those directions were given to every department head. They’ve done, to a large extent, a very very good job at it.”

But some of the line-items in Carlisle’s $1.9 billion operating budget may surprise you. For example, the $2.3 million the mayor proposed spending on food next year is enough money to buy 623,306 Big Macs, or 271,226 Zip Packs from Zippy’s.

Here are some of the appropriations from the mayor’s 2012 budget proposal that caught Civil Beat’s attention:

• $43.2 million on electricity, up 5 percent from last year.
• $3.4 million on telephones, down 8 percent from last year
• $2.7 million on unclassified supplies, down 58 percent last year (after increasing 335 percent the year before)
• $2.3 million on breakfast, lunch, dinner and other food
• $1.7 million in towing services, up 8 percent from last year
• $1.3 million in cleaning and toilet supplies, up 6 percent from last year
• $1.1 million in postage, down 4 percent from last year
• $800,000 for tuition payments, up 8 percent from last year
• $721,200 for ammunition, up 44 percent from last year
• $709,905 on advertising and public notices, down 2 percent from last year (after increasing 157 percent the year before)
• $559,700 for roofing, up 1,205 percent from last year
• $2,500 on bus wash soap, up 317 percent from last year
• $582,900 for renting motor vehicles, down 4 percent from last year
• $361,000 on “animal consumption,” unchanged since last year
• $180,370 on lightbulbs, down 1 percent from last year (after going up 22 percent the year before)

City Council Budget Chairman Ernie Martin has said the mayor’s plan isn’t actually as lean as it could be. Carlisle said he believes that some of Martin’s proposals — like proposed across-the-board cuts to department spending — are reasonable.