This past weekend, I was informed by a lifeguard that they eliminated a few EMT/lifeguards this summer due to budget cuts. If this was a budget cut item, then as a taxpayer who just had his taxes increased half a cent by the city, can someone explain why keeping a maintenance person for the beach patrol is more important than keeping EMT lifeguards? This is on top of the maintenance person being the highest paid person on the patrol, in addition to him/her being eligible for a lifeguard pension without ever taking a lifeguard re-qualification test.