Despite all our talk about how to improve this year’s budget process – it seems we have made no progress and seem to be going backwards!
Here’s the Council’s Operating budget process:
1. 10/7 Mayor Introduces Budget – this is the first time the Council members get to see the budget.
2. 10/13 & 10/14 Board of Estimates meetings – Less than a week later, we have to have read the hundreds of pages and asked as many preliminary questions as possible and be prepared to ask city agencies any questions we might have. Technically, this is only the Board of Estimates that meets, but all alders are ex officio members of all committees and we can participate in discussions, but not vote. However, the Mayor has a practice of calling on Board of Estimates members first – then us second class citizens get called on. And in the past, there were not enough chairs or microphones for all the alders and many did not participate because when you had a question you had to get someone who had a chair at the table to give up their spot so you could speak. We are attempting to modify this procedure for this year, to make sure all alders can have meaningful dialog during this procedure, otherwise, the only opportunity to ask questions of staff is done privately and then we get a huge list of amendments that take up alot of discussion time when we pass the budget. We’d like to have some of this discussion done before we get to the budget meetings.
10/21 – Board of Estimates members amendments are due to the Comptroller. If anyone not on the Board of Estimates wants to submit an amendment, they have to find a sponsor from the Board of Estimates to agree to submit it.
10/24 – Board of Estimates agenda (with amendments) available. The agenda for Board of Estimates is available Friday between noon and 3:00 and we will be able to see what amendments have been recommended. We then have the weekend to review the amendments, but can’t ask staff any questions because they are unavailable. We Monday to ask questions of staff or we have to ask the at the Board of Estimates meeting.
10/27 – Board of Estimates meeting on the amendments. When the Board of Estimates discusses these amendments, we’ll likely be back in the same position where alders who are not on Board of Estimates won’t have a place at the table. So, participation by alders will likely be minimal and we’ll have counter amendments that will be submitted at council.
10/28 – Public Hearing on the Budget. At this point, the public is asked to give input on the budget that was just amended the day before. How they’re supposed to know what they want to testify about, when the budget was amended less than 24 hours earlier and how they are supposed to get be informed is beyond me. This public hearing is nearly useless.
11/4 – Council amendments are due. This is one week after the Board of Estimates meeting. We often get several do-overs. Either amendments that failed at the Board of Estimates that alders think will pass at the council or amendments by council members that attempt to reverse the Board of Estimates decisions.
11/6 – Council members get the amendments of our colleagues to see what we will be voting on 5 days later. We have 3.5 business days to ask questions of staff before we vote.
11/11 (6:30), 11/12 (7:00) & 11/13 (7:00) – Council meetings to hear public testimony (likely only the first day) and then discussion of the budget amendments.
That’s the process for this year.
