HAMILTON — A day after International Paper Co. announced it will cut 350 jobs here, city leaders told about a dozen residents that services will be strained. But they offered no specifics during Friday's hastily organized meeting.

        The eventual closing of IP's Knightsbridge complex means the city's projected $600,000 shortfall for the 2001 budget will be even greater. The projection is partly due to the loss of jobs earlier this year at Ohio Casualty Insurance. The upside, City Manager Steve Sorrell said, is that the more than 400,000 square feet of IP's class A office space is very marketable.

        “But in the interim, it's going to be difficult for us,” Mr. Sorrell said after the hourlong meeting. “We're going to have to initiate a retrenchment effort in order to make the budget balance and to get by. We have to live on the money we have.”

        IP's decision could mean a reduction of about $1 million a year to city coffers if a buyer cannot be found. Emergency services, which are already down from normal levels and are paid for out of Hamilton's $34 million general fund, could take a significant hit, city officials said.

        Mr. Sorrell said the city's hiring freeze will remain, and he has instructed department heads to tighten their requests for the 2001 budget.

        Economic Development Director Tim Bigler said the Knightsbridge complex, on about 70 acres on the south side of Hamilton near the Great Miami River, “won't stay vacant very long.”

        “We want to try to work with (IP) to put the best use that we can possibly find back into the building,” Mr. Bigler said. He said the city wants to replace the IP jobs with comparable ones.

        Mayor Adolf Olivas even suggested marketing the Knightsbridge facility along with Peck's Addition, an adjacent 80-acre site being readied for smaller, mixed-use development.

        With the elimination of the 350 jobs, Hamilton is expected to lose more than $500,000 in payroll taxes. Last year, Hamilton collected about $21 million in income taxes, with IP contributing about 2.3 percent of the total. IP pays the city about $400,000 in real and personal property taxes annually.

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