July and August showed no improvement in Tempe’s tax revenues from June’s dismal numbers, which showed a 9 percent decrease since the previous year, the city manager said.

“For the [last] two months we’re now down 8.8 percent, so there’s not much variance,” City Manager Charlie Meyer told the City Council on Thursday.

Meyer gave Mayor Hugh Hallman and members of the council a presentation on tax revenues, as well as measures to be taken to help ease the city’s budget crisis, at Thursday’s issue-review session.

The tax revenues generated by retail sales in Tempe go to funding many of the city’s public services, including the Orbit and Flash bus lines, which could adversely affect students relying on the buses to get around campus.

Meyer also discussed with council members ways to deal with the crisis, including instituting a hard hiring freeze in which vacant positions in Tempe city government are kept vacant for up to a year and deferring the purchase of new vehicles for the Orbit and Flash lines until the next fiscal year starts in summer 2009.

Hallman said the budget crisis in Tempe called for cutbacks on wasteful and unnecessary programs.

“I don’t want to spend any money on long-term expenditures that I’m not totally sure have long-term value,” Hallman said.