GARY | A day after pleading with the state for a financial lifeline for his city, Gary Mayor Rudy Clay defended inking a deal for a new city-paid Hummer.

"What do you want me to do, walk around here?" Clay asked Tuesday. "I've got to have a car."

That car is a 2009 Hummer H3 purchased recently by the city, to be paid in three yearly installments totaling about $29,970, city spokeswoman LaLosa Burns said.

On Monday, Clay and a slew of city and county officials pitched a case before the state's Distressed Unit Appeals Board to provide Gary relief from new property tax caps.

One member of that panel charged with deciding Gary's fiscal fate cast doubt Tuesday that Gary has proven its need for state help if it still is buying automobiles.

"It's disappointing to learn this the day after Mayor Clay asked the Distressed Unit board to raise the property tax caps," said Ryan Kitchell, chairman of the appeals board and director of the Indiana Office of Management and Budget. "We will only consider doing so after the city has cut all that it can. The new Hummer and testimony presented yesterday clearly show that much more spending can be cut."

More than 30 Gary residents submitted comments to the board opposing the bailout, some of which lambasted the city for funding the boxy vehicle.

One letter read: "I find it repulsive that this administration would be asking for relief while Mayor Clay continues to drive a Hummer, a noneconomical, gas-guzzling vehicle at the taxpayers' expense, which is equivalent to the CEO's of the Big Three automakers coming to Washington in their corporate jets asking Congress for a bailout."

On Monday, panel member Mark GiaQuinta, of Fort Wayne, said the letters he has seen tell him that Gary residents want to see "profound change" before the city is granted any relief from the tax caps.

"I frankly have read all I want to read about a Hummer," GiaQuinta said. "But I do think, to some degree, symbolism plays a role here."

Clay said Tuesday he felt the board was dismissing the Hummer as "a petty issue. They don't want to hear about it, and I don't blame them."

The mayor's wheels have been a hot-button topic among some residents for years since Clay rode into office in his own Hummer H3. He is reported as saying that version ran the city about $26,000.

Though he expressed frustration in doing so, Clay defended his vehicle choice Tuesday, saying, "I put my own gas in this Hummer. It's one of the cheapest SUVs. So what's the problem?

"There's a bigger issue than the Hummer I'm driving," he said. "We've got major, major financial issues over here in Gary."

In their plea to the appeals board, Gary officials have asked for four years to cope with new tax caps, which are projected to siphon $30.3 million from the city's 2009 budget.

"I don't want to continue to make a mountain out of a molehill," Clay said, noting that he voluntarily took a 20 percent pay cut in the midst of the city's fiscal meltdown.

Not only is his vehicle fuel efficient and requires little upkeep, Clay said, but it also saves Gary residents cash.

"We're saving taxpayers money by riding in a Hummer," he said. "I could've bought a $50,000 Expedition."