Budget Process for 8/12 Budget Meeting

[Max Lars]

Council Members:

This is to outline how we'll proceed tomorrow. As always, with the budget, there are a number of moving parts. I'll work to keep things orderly and consistent with rules and procedures.

We have six items on the agenda that are "public hearings". We will open and conduct each public hearing in order. Once all speakers have been called for the specific hearing, we will close the public hearing.

Before we vote on any item related to a public hearing, we will hear comments on the other Council agenda items. There are 16 items that are not public hearings and not separate board meetings. They are items 7 through 22. We will hear comment on these like we do on our consent agenda at regular meetings. The clerk will call the speakers for each item in order.

After we conclude all public comments and begin voting, we will start with item 7, which is the ordinance to approve the city budget. The motion will be to adopt the City Manager's proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2026--2027 filed on July 10, 2026.

This motion is the starting point. Once we have this motion, the first amendments we will consider are "staff amendments", which are things our finance staff consider clean up items. Think of them like changes and corrections. This will include the social services amendment that we discussed during the last meeting.

The next proposed amendments will be those that are "cost neutral" or "revenue neutral". Then, we will go to those that cost money and change the total budget dollar amount as moved and amended.

VERY IMPORTANT--

Please offer any proposed amendment by referencing the item. By that, I mean a description of the item that's in the main motion that you wish to remove or edit and a description, including the dollar amount, of the change. It is imperative that we have these proposed items in writing. My recommendation is that you write the amendments in such a way that they say something to the effect of:

"I move to amend the proposed budget referring to [insert the language of that line in the proposed budget] by replacing it with [insert language you wish to put into the proposed budget].

Or

"I move to amend the proposed budget referring to [insert the language of that line in the proposed budget] by replacing the amount of money in line ___ of the proposed budget with an amount equal to ___."

Or

"I move to amend the proposed budget referring to [insert the language of that line in the proposed budget] by removing the line item."


If you want to identify where any new money is taken from (from another item or reserves, for example), please add the language: "The additional funding will come from ___". Otherwise, it will be assumed it is added to the tax rate.

When we've finished hearing all of the proposed amendments, we will recess for a short period so that staff can assure calculations based on amendments and assure us of where we are. Once we have the final count, we will vote on the main motion as amended.

After that is completed, we will move in this order:

Item 6--Fee and Fine Ordinances. If we adopt item 6, that will include adopting the rates that had hearing in items 2, 3, 4 and 5.

Items 8, 9 and 10--Sworn Service Classification

Items 11 and 1--We will take up item 11 first to ratify any tax increase in the budget. We will then take up item 1 to approve the ordinance adopting the tax rate.

Items 12--22--IFCs and Staff items.

We will then recess the Council meeting and I'll call to order the AHFC meeting and, upon adjournment, then the Mueller Local Government Corporation Meeting.

Once all of this is done, we'll complete and adjourn the Council meeting.

Thanks, everyone. I look forward to a productive day tomorrow.

Kirk
On Behalf of Mayor Watson