Good evening and welcome to the Common Council meeting, housing and committee development committee.

So committee two times, but uh it's Monday, November 17th.

Today I'm joined by Councilmember Kimbrell, Councilwoman Zamer, and I'm your chair of Derek Johnson.

Today we will um be speaking about budget set aside for um housing related activities, and we will start with um public comment.

Uh first, can we have Julia Long speak?

You can come up right here and I'll turn on your mic.

So good evening.

I was here before I'm gonna say the same thing.

Oh, can you hear me?

How's that?

Okay.

So good evening, esteemed legislators and neighbors.

My name is Julia Long, an Albany resident, and I am the founder and executive director of the Alternative to Economic and Housing Displacement Inc., a 501c3 nonprofit organization serving tenants as well as small landlords in Albany City Housing Court.

Um the people I help in Albany Housing Court are tenants as well as small landlords who cannot afford to pay me.

Most people find themselves in housing court due to their non-payment of rent.

Therefore, they depend on the generosity of my neighbors for support.

Small landlords who struggle to pay their mortgages, pay taxes and other obligations, even when tenants failed to pay rent.

These folks are also uh people who I helped.

So, first I want to thank you for the work that you're doing around housing.

I know it's not easy, and I appreciate you.

To this end, I'm here to offer assistance in your efforts to address Albany housing crisis.

To popcorn on various housing initiatives, quite simply our neighbors need you.

I need you, the City of Albany residents, almost 70% of whom are renters need you.

As a black woman business owner, federal cuts to diversity, equity and inclusion, DEI, as well as cuts from housing, urban and development HUD, and most recently SNAP have hurt the services I provide to small landlords tenants in the City of Albany, the majority of whom are either black women, head of households, most of whom have school age children under their care, and many are caring for their elderly parents as well.

The housing crisis can't wait.

As the winter solstice approaches, so too is the increasing number of evictions.

Statistics show that almost 90% of those facing evictions whose cases are calendared in housing court, and if they have legal assistance to inform them of their rights as tenants, they remain housed.

Let me repeat that.

Almost 90% of families, mostly black women and children facing eviction, kept their homes, remained housed when they had legal assistance.

And when people stay housed, they are not a burden on city taxpayers who would otherwise have to pay to house them in city shelters.

There is money set aside for a vacancy study that wasn't studied.

So I'm asking, I'm not asking for new money.

I understand in these tough economic times as legislators, sometimes you have to borrow from Peter to pay Paul, so to speak, and I applaud your efforts.

But this time I'm here to ask for funding because your uh before your budget is enacted.

I'm sorry.

The money is already there, and I'm not asking for all of it, because I know there are other organizations like United Tenants behind me who do this work as well.

So I'm not here to be greedy.

The work that my organization does saves tax dollars while saving our residents from homelessness.

Let me help you close the gap in Albany's housing crisis.

So thank you for your work, and I really appreciate you all and have a good evening.

And next we have Kenyon Ryan.

Good evening.

I'm here to really just echo what Ms.

Long spoke about today or just a moment ago.

When we fought for this money after the housing vacancy study determined that there was not a sufficient vacancy rate for the city to opt into rent stabilization.

At the time we were advocating for 125,000 to be set aside so that the city could redo the vacancy study if it was so inclined to do.

And after a careful consideration, the council decided that that was not the direction that they wanted to go with this money.

And that housing initiative, well, we think what makes the most sense is for this money to go to tenants in the city of Albany who are at risk of eviction uh due to their low income status, due to neglect of the property, due to an eviction proceeding, et cetera.

Um the United Tenants of Albany has about $650,000 that have been impacted by federal HUD cuts, pauses, or you know, grants that were just unofficially terminated, um, including money that is owed back to the organization due to a city of Albany and HUD substantial amendment from last October that still hasn't been resolved.

So 120,000 that was expended as contracted and expected and never repaid due to the way that HUD is managing the City of Albany contract.

Uh in addition to that, 100,000 dollars has been held up and uh been prevented from being able to save tenants as housing because we have no expectation of when or if we're ever going to be repaid by HUD for the home SS money.

So there is a very clear issue here where HUD is cutting back programs.

We saw that they intend to reduce the permanent supportive housing budget by two-thirds uh in addition to the already existing problems, in addition to carving out or essentially obliterating the fair housing department at HUD.

Um so there is no better opportunity or moment to capitalize on with this funding than to support the tenants that the federal government is is clearly neglecting and turning its back on.

And what we know is that the city of Albany's common council has always stood with tenants for tenants and defended tenants' rights and really led the way in trailblaze on tenant protections, and now is a really good opportunity for the city of Albany to directly invest in the community-based organizations that are supporting these tenants and also more importantly um the tenants themselves that are at risk of eviction due to no fault of their own, other than substantial HUD cuts.

So we would love to see this money uh broken up into pots that are you know spread wide so that no single organization is capitalizing on this funding, but that the need gets to all the organizations that are supporting tenants and therefore all the tenants that are coming to our organizations.

Uh and and just to leave you with one final stat this year UTA has distributed over 450,000 dollars to support 315 low-income tenants at risk of eviction or to secure new housing, in addition to supporting over 450 tenants across the county, but at least 375 here in the city of Albany.

Um our walk-in office has received 10% more walk-in traffic this year than last year uh in just the 11 months that we've already been through.

So over 1,200 walk-ins have come through our office of people seeking assistance, um, which has just been really kind of sad.

So really excited for this opportunity and thank um Chair Johnson for holding this committee meeting.

Thank you.

So at this time, I would also like to recognize that we have um oh I'm sorry.

Sorry, just one more public comment.

Tim Sarber.

Thank you.

Um Tim Starver.

Uh also new to United Tenants.

Um the HUD cuts have been devastating, I think, for tenants and uh for our organization as well.

Um we are still fighting to help them as much as we can, and I'm here just because I think that our organization and the other organizations that are fighting for tenants um need to show up to to help where we can.

Things have already been hard for tenants as rent costs are continuing to climb.

Whatever assistance we can be to tenants to keep people housed.

That's all I have.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Again, I would like to uh recognize our council staff.

We have Robert Winter, our council.

We also have Brian Jimenez, our legislative director, and we have we are joined by Carly Johnson, our junior legislative aid.

At this point, I want to um open up the mic to our committee members if they have anything to say.

Any questions or comments.

So I just would like to um say thank you to our speakers is because is through public comment that brought us to this um this meeting because it's important that we don't let this money go back to the general fund, it was intended on housing.

Um and you know, when I listen to you all speak, it's been many times in my life that um UTA has played a part in me being able to make it um through the situation that I was dealing with, and it's important that you know I carry those experiences everywhere with me because a lot of us are one payment, one check away from being in um a similar situation.

So with all that's going on in the world, it just made a lot of sense when I um when it was brought to my attention about this money, and I would like to do everything that I can as the chair to try to uh make this make sense, you know, make it um do the best that it can do to help as many people as as it can.

So um I don't know where where it goes from here, but I definitely wanted to make sure that we had a um conversation and to give committee members a chance to put their head um on on on this and see how we can um you know assist the people that are assistant people that need help, and um we know that that number is not going to get any smaller, and um I would like to also say that we're um joined by committee member Sergio Um Adams as well as councilman Tom Hoey.

So um I would like to reopen the floor up, even though Councilman Adams just came in.

I know that he has um something to offer this conversation.

Sorry to throw you right in like that, but uh we're gonna move this along.

Yes, uh thank you, Chair, for allowing me to just share a few comments in regards to the discussion on budget and housing.

Um I understand that this is a tough budget cycle for the city and for many of us council members who um are trying to find ways to alleviate the burden from taxpayers.

Um while we're all aware of the housing issues uh that go on around the city from um big developers down to small landlords, uh, but also to the inequalities that exist when it comes to uh maintenance and care of these properties.

Um would love to see a budget that reflects a much stronger housing initiative that pushes for um more ops more housing options for individuals in need, um, but also focusing on that uh working class population to find alternative housing.

When we talk about home ownership, there's a huge discussion on trying to assist young homeowners or first-time home buyers with the financial resources to be able to get their first home.

But with the data and things, the market of how things are, um, most homeowners and people who own property are home holding on to their homes, uh making it very difficult for young people and families to um get their first home.

But um, as I mentioned earlier, with this budget, I would love to see a much stronger emphasis on some of those housing needs.

Um, I believe it's our goal to continue to really push um for those with our intent memo and um working with our finance committee and this upcoming administration to really uh push and bolster um some of the initiatives that we have discussed over the last few years here in this council um and addressing the housing concerns for many people in the city of Albany.

So just want to thank the chair for being able to have this conversation and for other committee members joining the conversation because again, this requires a lot of attention and um dedication to make sure that we're striving to hit these goals for our residents.

So thank you.

And I'm hoping that this evening's um council meeting and budget session um again um allows people to understand what's what's in the future and what's possible and understanding that with this hopefully incoming administration that um our council will still continue to push those strong housing initiatives that uh residents wants to see.

So thank you.

Again, thank you.

Um we're also joined by councilman Alfredo Ballorin, and I um wanted to open up the floor to Mr.

Howie if he had any comments.

I came in late, but um I agree with uh the council member uh Adams that we gotta come up with a way to make homeownership affordable to young families, new people coming into the city.

We do attract people through the universities and colleges in the area.

They come up to Albany, they like it, they want to live here, but they can't afford to live here.

So we need to do something.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And at this time, I wanted to open up the floor to council and ballarin if he had anything to offer.

Thank you, Chair.

I apologize that I am uh a little bit behind.

Um I appreciate you having a meeting here today.

I think part of the discussion is to try to focus on uh some of the resources that we put together last last year uh on housing.

Is that is that correct?

Um and I appreciate the committee members and everyone here and all those that have uh come out to uh look at some options.

I think there's some good options that uh we should look at, uh including trying to find ways to fill some gaps with the federal government uh is creating horrors.

So uh I look forward to hear those conversations and be a part of it in any way that I can.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And again, I just want to point out you know, um, in my experience, when you go down to court dealing with housing, two of the first faces you're gonna see is Ms.

Long and Um Canyon.

And so uh as the chair and when we're having this discussion about how the money and where the money should go, I definitely would like and would hope that it would land in the hands of people that are actually doing the work and you know, um, give us a chance to empower helpers.

A lot of times um people always feel like the people that are helping are straight, you know, um, they can handle the things that they're um attempting to address, and that's not always the case.

So, you know, um let's keep in mind and and let's um try to work with the people that are working with the people that need um help right now.

And as I said earlier, this number is not gonna get um smaller.

Um these courts are gonna get um overburdened with uh people being separated from their um current housing.

So uh I look forward to um us coming up and and developing the plan.

I'm sorry, some others couldn't be here tonight that um wanted to uh that had things to share.

So uh also would like to recognize um councilman Richard Connie who walked in as being um graceful not to walk in in the middle of the meeting, but he is uh joined us, and I would like to give him uh opportunity to speak if he um so with that being said I look forward to the next meeting, and I believe it will be scheduled um tonight before we leave so that we can um follow this back up.

Um tonight before we leave so that we can um follow this back up.

What at this point?

Did anyone else have anything that they wanted to say before we close out the meeting?

I'm sorry.

Um are we looking to allocate the funding at this point?

Because this is from this is from twenty twenty five's budget.

Uh and I think we need to have it allocated before the end of the fiscal year.

So are we looking to is that part of what today's conversation or honestly um it was a discussion and um wanted to first before we start talking about allocating anything, I wanted to give committee members a chance to have input on it, and it seems like we're all in agreement that we um should do um something positive to try to um make a imprint on the housing crisis.

So with that being said, I think that our next meet, I think that we can have some um discussions and then um call another committee meeting and just uh move in that I didn't want to do anything hasty.

Um I wanted to have the um have uh people who didn't have a chance to participate in this meeting to have a chance to put their name in the hat and um and try to do this responsibly.

So tonight I didn't have any intentions on allocating money.

Um I think that to uh give people a week or so um will put us in a position to be able to uh finish it up before this um calendar year is over.

So with that um said, do we have a um motion?

Motion to adjourn.

Thank you.

No, I don't think there's enough here.

Okay, everyone.

Well, we're missing our staff.

All right.

Okay, welcome everyone to the Monday, November 17th caucus and work session of the Albany Common Council.

It's our work session prior to our regular meeting.

Miss Jackson, would you please call the role?

Yes.

Adams.

Present.

Anani.

Gallarin.

Clark.

Conzi.

Here.

Farrow.

Here.

Flynn.

Frederick.

Howie.

Here.

Johnson.

Project.

Keegan.

Here.

Kimbrough.

Here.

Love.

Here.

Robinson.

Zamer.

Here.

Ten present, five absent.

We are also.

We good?

Good.

Yes.

Okay.

Yes.

Uh, thank you everyone for for being here with us tonight.

We're gonna before jumping into the agenda, we're gonna start with a bit of information.

We're gonna hear from uh Chief Brendan Cox on the recent incident that occurred in front of uh the library on November 4th.

Um the idea is to hear from the chief.

We're not doing question and answer.

It's gonna he's gonna impart a little bit of information to us, and and that's gonna be the extent of that because we'd set us well, we have a lot of business to take care of for one, with the budget and things, but also we'd be setting ourselves up for failure to to be doing a question and answer where there are tons of questions that he can't provide us with answers for.

So um we'll Kelly.

I believe we're also setting up a meeting in the near future.

Right, yeah.

Uh moving.

Where we where council is.

And then also following the chief, we'll have uh our program director from the CPRB uh share a bit of quick information with us also.

So with that, I'll turn it over to you, Chief.

Thank you, Councilman.

Thank you for having me here tonight.

Um so on November 4th, at approximately 401 p.m., the Albany Police Department received a call for service from staff at the main branch of the Albany Public Library, one sixty-one Washington Avenue for a fight, and police officers were dispatched and responded to the address situation.

Officers were arrived shortly after the call was received.

Emergency medical personnel were already on the scene.

During the initial call, an officer attempted to detain an adult female who failed to comply with the officer's commands and also bit the officer in the leg.

That woman was subsequently taken into custody and charged with one count of assault second, one count of obstructing governmental administration, one count of resisting arrest, and one count of harassment second.

The actions of the officer during the detainment and arrest of the female and his subsequent interactions with several other people quickly came into concern and have since become the subject of an internal investigation within the department's office of professional standards.

I want to note that I completely understand the community's concerns, and I understand the members of this council's concerns.

It's what you should expect from your department, and it's exactly what happened that night.

The department's desire is to have a complete and accurate investigation into this matter, as we would in any case where an officer may have acted inappropriately.

We have a process to address these issues, and I want to assure everyone that that process is well underway.

It has been well underway since November 4th.

This includes interviewing witnesses, both internal witnesses and external witnesses, and reviewing things like video, both our own video and video that includes video we do not have control over.

It also includes working with our stakeholders, especially the community police review board, no matter what state the CPRB is in.

And I don't say that as anything other than understanding what the state the CPRB is in.

But I also want to note that internal investigations start in the police department, and they happen no matter what the state of the CPRB is in, and they will happen no matter what happens with the CPRB.

I fully stand behind the CPRB.

I fully stand behind independent, external, independent investigation.

I'm perfectly I've made that statement over and over again.

I made it before I left in 2017.

I've made it while I was gone.

I've made it since I've been back.

But independent of the CPRB, there's an entire process that exists within the Albany Police Department for investigations, and that has been going on no matter what, just like it has in this case.

So I understand the concerns of this council.

I understand the concerns of others, but I certainly hope we're not going to get caught up in something that we don't need to get caught up in when it comes to.

I know everybody's trying to address the CPRB, but we need to address this investigation as this investigation and not part of a broader issue that is currently going on.

We do have an open door policy when it comes to the CPRB, and we will continue to have that.

We have that with this case, and we have this with every case.

We have a open door policy when it comes to all of you, and we will continue to have that.

I believe strongly in the tenets of procedural justice.

I believe in that for our public and for our officers.

I believe in being fair and just, and in order to do so, I need to have a full investigation to take place.

I want that investigation to be transparent, but I also need to make sure that there's due process that's going to take place, and we need to make sure that that balanced approach takes place, and that's what we're doing.

So that process is undergoing that in the that internal investigation, and I'm confident that as that investigation comes to an end, we will be better as a department, and we will be better for a city when that happens.

And I'll be happy to meet with you all further as we move further into that.

I've been asked to give a timeline.

But there are other people that are not under my control that we need to ultimately interview.

There is other independent video that we are attempting to get.

So I just want to be a little bit careful.

We are going to get this investigation done as quickly as possible and come to an outcome as quickly as possible.

So I'm just asking for a little bit of time.

We normally ask for a 30-day to 60-day turnaround.

I'm going to try to get that done as soon as I possibly can, but again, it's easy for me to call in our own employees and interview.

Okay, Mr.

Shaff, you got 10 minutes.

I hope it's not going to be that long.

Five minutes.

Good evening.

Good evening, everyone.

Based off of recent changes to the CPRB as reported in the news and known to members of this body, I'm here to reassure the community and this body that CPRB is still operational and working for the City of Albany.

In addition to the CPRB still accepting complaints and responding to them, we are busy working to ensure that once the body and or once this body and/or the mayor appoint new members, we new members, we can quickly resume the public work of the board.

I am pleased to report that the CPRB is receiving and responding to complaints to include complaints related to the incident Chief Cox just spoke about.

Participating in prospective new member interviews, which we did today earlier this with the public safety committee.

We interviewed, we participated in an interview of three prospective new members.

Finalizing job postings to hire a senior investigator, investigator, and confidential secretary.

Last week, all of those job postings were approved by the board and provided for final submission and publication with human resources.

Earlier today, we published a request for proposal for the CPRB's outside legal services.

We are in the process of finalizing a draft or proposal for investigative services and hope to have that done later this week.

We are presenting tomorrow to the APD's recruit academy of new officers, myself and two board members.

We are in the process of crafting a survey to solicit community input and feedback on how to address the historic backlog of the board's caseload as well as if there needs to be adjustments to membership qualifications.

We are in the process of laying the foundation to resume complaint reviews once a quorum is established to include completing internal reviews of complaints so they can be presented and voted on once a meeting can resume.

To date, in 2025, the CPRB has received received approximately 78 complaints and has approximately 148 open complaints.

Approximately 70 of those 148 complaints are pending member review presentation and vote.

We are actively working to ensure that once we have a quorum, we can immediately proceed with those reviews.

Thank you, Mr.

Shaff.

All right, so we'll get into our regular agenda and move on to our budget things.

So uh just starting out at the top of the agenda, we'll have uh a couple of uh public hearings, uh public hearing uh ordinance 2062, uh ordinance 1682 25, ordinance 1991 25, and ordinance 2710125.

Those would be the subject of the of the public hearings.

Kelly we had a couple of uh council members come during the presentation.

Uh Hyde and I believe some oh okay.

So we're also joined by council members um Frederick and Um Hyde Clark.

Thank you, Mr.

Howe.

Okay, so on to um meetings from a previous meeting, I'll be offering the November 3rd of 2025 meeting minutes for approval.

Okay, then on to local laws, we'll be taking up local law F for introduction by Ms.

Zamber.

So local law in relation to the uh monuments commission in relation to the scope of the commission's responsibilities and authority, that will be referral of the law committee.

Uh the next local law C sponsored by council member Frederick will be an amendment.

I think uh we're adjusting amending some salaries and that, but that's for amendment only.

Do you want to say something about it?

Yeah, the amendment is just aligning um the positions to what we have in practice and also in the budget book.

Prior uh local law did not recognize the President Pro Tem or the majority leader uh salary, and so it needs to be amended tonight age, and then we can vote on it next meeting.

Thank you.

And so uh then after that, we'll be taking up local law D also by Ms.

Frederick of 2025.

You want to local local law D voice collection?

Local audio, uh yes, so might be easier to talk about this.

Uh in the okay, right.

So after we after we deal with the local laws, uh based on Mr.

Conte's suggestion that we kind of group everything together, what we're gonna do is after we get through uh the local laws, we'll take uh ordinance 2710125 out of order.

Uh resolution one two three one oh one twenty-five and resolution one three two one one two twenty-five are uh out of order to group all of the the budget stuff together.

And so if you actually want to now we can uh you you want to start.

Can you repeat the um uh bring it out of taking out of order?

Ordinance 27 101 25, resolution 123 101 25, and resolution 132 11225.

Kelly, for purposes of discussion here.

Can I suggest that we go through the rest and then go back and have that at the end so you have more time to go through everything?

Okay, yeah.

Yep, Ms.

Frederick, however, you want to take us through it.

Please look at the rest of the advantage.

Oh, and then go back to oh, okay, yeah.

All right, so we'll do that.

All right, so then next uh under resolutions um be a resolution by me uh pending amendment.

It's uh excuse me, ordinance uh pending amendment uh ordinance 2661 uh 23.

That's MWBE ordinance uh came out of committee with a positive recommendation.

We're waiting on some updates to the the uh percentages which went out uh to members a couple days ago for for review.

Uh so we made the adjustments to the percentages and uh look forward to moving forward with passing that um then next uh resolution 2062 24's ordinance uh for what the parking um permit system and modifying the boundaries that uh is under consideration also that's been talked about and came out of uh committee with a positive recommendation.

Uh the next uh this is uh Mr.

Hyde's 24101 25.

So we're doing let me go through my second.

All right, okay, good.

Gotta hear.

So yeah, we'll be taking up Mr.

Hyde's 24 uh 101 25.

It's there's a uh amendment that went out, it should be on everyone's desk.

Uh I don't know if you had a chance to review it or not.

Um we'll be uh discussing that.

Um next uh resolution is the budget one, so we'll we'll skip past that one.

Uh the next uh Mr.

Conti's resolution introduced 131-112-25.

So resolution recognizing transgender day remembrance and honoring lives loss to anti-uh transgender violence.

I believe members expressed desire to be co-sponsors did with the clerk.

Yeah, Kelly.

Excuse me.

On that one, uh is it possible uh after public comment if we can take that up out of order uh for possible presentation?

Um I'm expecting that there'll probably be some people here later.

So is that that's why that's you got you guys have that?

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

Okay, then next uh that 132 is the budget.

Um we'll discuss that.

The next under resolutions held uh by me 979125 is resolution honoring uh the contributions of Maggie Massinelli Cahill and renaming a portion of North Pearl Street in her honor that came through the general services committee with a positive recommendation.

We'll be moving forward with that.

Uh that was one for the mayor in my area.

Uh then next resolution 111225 by council member Bowran's resolution honor life and legacy of Dennis Lee Edney and renaming the portion of Washington Avenue in his honor.

We'll be moving forward with that.

Then uh next is uh the homestead non-homestead, which Ms.

Frederick will be speaking to.

And then uh lastly, uh by Ms.

Frederick 128-111-25.

Uh so resolution of council reappointing Francis Francis Cosgrove as a member of the board assessment review.

So originally uh Mr.

Cosgrove came to the finance committee, spoke about wanting to continue service, um, well qualified 15 years service to the board of assessment and review.

Um ultimately uh prior to was a part of the State Department of Tax, so a wealth of experience.

He was invited to come this evening.

He unfortunately had surgery.

He's recovering, so he couldn't join us this evening.

Uh but I do ask for um your support, and if there's any questions, we're happy to print his resume out for the body.

Right, and he's been with us for a length of time, so I think most members would be okay with moving ahead with him.

Mr.

Johnson?

Yes, I just wanted to express my disappointment.

Um the the gentleman that we use to um make the point of honoring people who are still alive has um not been mentioned as far as um street name is is uh concerned.

And if he was in my if I had the ability, I would have said Lloyd Stewart from day one.

Um just wanted to uh put that out there because we used him to make the argument about recognizing people while they were still here, letting people have their um flowers and um it didn't happen for him, so I just wanted to sad that what am I gonna do?

Say no.

The person that needs to hear this is not listening right now, but thank you.

Say no, and then we say just kidding.

So thank you, uh Mr.

Johnson.

So that was uh it did I miss anything on the agenda?

Uh because we're gonna go to Miss Frederick right now.

Yeah.

What did I miss?

I'm sorry.

Uh I'm sorry, thank you.

Uh President Botan.

Uh I know we we need to talk about the budget, but uh uh if we have time after the budget, I was hoping we have a quick discussion about the amendments to ordinance 24.101.25.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

So we yeah, we have to uh we have some time.

Thanks.

So do you want to uh do the budget stuff first?

I mean, okay, we'll do the budget stuff first, but we definitely have to talk about uh ordinance 24.

So Ms.

Frederick.

Thank you.

Um and starting by thanking you all for your commitment to the budget season and providing the transparency to our city and really looking at ways that we are best serving our constituency.

Um as an update to you all, where we left was uh as a committee wanting to pursue a property tax decrease from three percent to two percent.

Um per discussion with the administration since our last meeting on Thursday.

Uh, we have hit some um differences there that I want to go go over with you.

So ultimately, the administration has made it very clear that if we go to two percent, um they will veto that they have made their stance.

I do anticipate the administration coming here this evening and beg giving public comment to that.

Um with that, they did provide their proposed amendments on behalf of the budget office to get us to that two percent, approximately six hundred thirty thousand.

Uh that was solely focused on uh reducing the summer youth employment program, non-tANF uh recipients.

So um obviously as a body, I don't want to assume, but we we will not be touching summer youth employment.

Um yeah, so uh secondary to that, they have agreed to uh, although their stance is we shouldn't do any reduction to a point five percent reduction to property taxes as a compromise that would not be vetoed by the administration.

Um your desk, you have an email from Chief of Staff David Gallon that I would like to walk you through.

This includes their proposed reductions for the 0.5 percent.

Um, in summary, all of these are areas where they are comfortable with reduction with the reductions approximate um coming to a total of 315,000 necessary for point five.

Starting from the top, it would be reduction to street light utilities of 100,000 um per the administration.

This is an expenditure they found that was mistakenly misclassified post-budget release, so there would be no effective loss in service.

The second being DGS hourly 100,000, this would be a reduction to DGS seasonals by 100k, current budget of 1.225 million in discussion with them further discussion, both over time and seasonals have increased over the years, and DGS and the administration have been in conversation about reducing hourly.

So they indicated that this wouldn't come um as a surprise, and this is where they need to go for the future.

Um the next being DGS motor vehicle repairs, 50,000 um means that DGS will need to hold some a portion of motor vehicle repair expenses uh closer to 2025 levels, so being consistent with the actuals from this year.

The next being a 4000 reduction to the city share of county elections expense this expense is controlled by the county however they indicated that the amount that we have allocated currently in the budget for that is more closer to what they would expect in the presidential year.

They do not anticipate a gubernatorial election year to come into that high of cost and so they think there's some wiggle room there.

And then finally 2800 reduction from administrative service office equipment this is the budget office forgoing purchases of new desk in 2026 and deferring to 2027.

So this is how the administration proposed going to 315 so two items on the table first their proposals going down to two percent would have been um from their proposals summer youth employment reduction second proposal from them compromised no veto 0.5% property tax reduction with their proposed adjustments I just walked through third that we wanted to put on the table for discussion this evening is the combination of the 0.5% reduction from the city plus an additional attempt by myself council member farrell Brian others to try to come up with another 31500 for your consideration I will say if you look at this it is not an easy task to find another 3500 315 in the budget.

This would include cutting from a number of office offices as you can see it would include reducing things like a live at five reducing tree services etc but we at least wanted to put an attempt in front of you this evening without just saying it would be summer youth employment so in summary this is the third um proposal on the table which would be a combination of their hundred their 315 plus our attempt to find another doubling of that number um I do want to have the body discussion with you all in my opinion in going through this process I think we should proceed forward with the 0.5% reduction I think it's a good faith effort to address affordability in our city it's also um reluctantly supported by the administration and comes to a compromise so I'm happy to take any questions comments but that's what I wanted to discuss this evening with you all councilmember Keegan.

For those who didn't come to our budget discussions and foremost I I think I'm the only person on the finance committee who did not support reducing revenue and I I feel very uncomfortable reducing revenue at all this year.

One of those pieces of that concern is that we have a new administration coming in it's a historic moment for our city and it's been made very clear to the finance committee that those reduction cuts may very well place our new administration or incoming administration in a position to have to override the tax cap for 2027 in addition to all the various other unknowns coming down the pike this fiscal year for the city of Albany I also do feel that there are already some structural issues in the budget in terms of what the anticipated revenue that is built in is in addition to that we have at least one outstanding union contract that will amount to roughly about a two million dollar hole in the budget.

So I for those who didn't kind of follow along with every single finance committee meeting and all of the discussions that we had I would really strongly urge my colleagues to support the best revenue outcome for the city so that we can really try to adequately maintain the services that we have going into 2026.

Thank you.

Uh and I want to thank all the hard work that was done by staff and council members as well as the administration to try to find a compromise.

I think compromise is very important.

Uh and uh most who have been watching the uh finance committee know that I was looking for a reduction originally in the trash fee to try to make it more affordable for our residents looking at the fact that it was such a large increase.

Um the committee came with a compromise to address the tax levy.

Uh and I I I appreciate that compromise that was put forward.

I uh I uh I know we have very tough days ahead of us.

Uh AWA funds are gone, and uh the budgets as we come forward are not gonna get easier.

Um, but I do still believe that it's important that we all get in the room and we all work on these issues uh without the feel of difficult conversations.

So I appreciate that.

I appreciate the work that was done by uh by all the committee members, and I appreciate the work that was done by the chair.

Uh and I will support the 2.5% levy.

Um recognizing the hard work that was done to try to find savings and to try to find us uh put us in a in a better place uh in the future.

So thank you, sir.

Thank you to all the committee members, uh, and thank you to the administration for their work on this.

Councilmember Adams.

Thank you.

Um, just wanted to put this out there and just conversation since we're we're having an open conversation about this, um, and want to thank you for your diligence and hard work through each budget process to advocate and um try to find ways to achieve some of our goals as a council.

Um my biggest takeaway right now as we've been going through this budget process is trying to figure out if the juice is worth the squeeze.

Um as we look at some of these cuts that are being proposed through various departments uh for activities, uh, we also have to look at the consequences that then result from having those cuts as well.

Um so that's also more loss in revenue uh for some of these events.

Um I understand that this is a very hard, difficult conversation, and wanting to um deliver um some results to constituents based off of the increases that we're seeing in this budget.

Um, however, again, um I I do I do appreciate and like the the compromise that was negotiated.

Um if we are going to um make an effort to provide some type of relief, I think this is maybe the best course.

Um, however, with that it's still the bigger question of is this the best thing to do um with knowing the um possible consequences that are down the line um that's gonna affect us in many different ways in the future.

So um for me um this is a very difficult decision to make, but I would love to support the um compromise um position of council members feel so um passionate about moving forward with this.

Um so um I just want to at least say that in the future um as we have more conversations about revenue and debt service and trying to find ways to um increase things, uh we're going to be having much more discussions about making cuts as well.

So um don't look forward to those conversations, but that is the reality um that we seem to be in.

Um so I'm hoping um that you know if this budget does go through or when it goes through that this next administration is prepared and ready to um provide the solutions to address it.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Farrell.

Thank you very much, and uh again, thank you, Chair, for all of you done to uh shepherd us through this difficult budget process.

Um as we go through the budget, and I will say uh well, Councilmember Frederick did do the lion's share of going through line by line.

I also went through, and I will say, having done that many years over the year, many times over the years, this definitely is a lot of the places where my go-to cuts would be were already cut.

So this is there's definitely a lot of work that was done by the administration to cut things in a lot of places before we even got the budget.

For anybody that is listening, that the only things that we are allowed to do in terms of amending the budget as a council is uh we have the ability to add or increase programs or amounts.

We may delete or decrease any programs or amounts, except, and the accept is a big one.

Um those items required by law, debt service judgment, salaries, or for estimated cash deficits.

So there's actually quite a few things in the budget that we are not able to hit touch, especially when it comes to salaries, which is um when it comes to a municipality, we are people powered, and that is and it should be the majority of what we can what we do as a municipality.

Um when it comes to a budget, you always have to look at two sides.

You want to make sure that you're spending on things that benefit your constituency, and I believe strongly that the administration worked hard to do that.

Um I think that the additions that they are putting in, they're doing because they believe it is what is best for our community.

Um, but with every budget, whether it's your home budget or a municipal budget, you have to look at both sides, and you have to look at your revenue, and you have to then look at your spending.

And sometimes, although you want to spend in certain areas, your revenue just doesn't allow it.

And that is one of my concerns is that I don't know that our revenue allows us or what we should be using as revenue with good conscience allows us to have the spending that we have.

And one of the reasons I say that is because when we had our tax assessments changed, I was going through every single neighborhood throughout the city, and I talked to a lot of people, particularly elderly people with two family homes, whose tax assessments and taxes went up dramatically.

Um our tax assessment changed, our two and three family homes had the most significant change in assessment and tax change.

And a lot of those homes are owned by people who are also closest to having an issue paying for maybe not able to pay for everything.

Um there's a lot of older people who had family that lived in the other apartment, and they were concerned that they would not be able to hold on to their home because the taxes would go up so dramatically.

So the difference between for those people whose taxes just went up dramatically between three percent and two percent is a big difference because their taxes just went up.

So I my heart would honestly prefer the two percent, and I will say it's not an easy two percent.

I I fully acknowledge that it is not one that I like.

There's cuts here that I would not like to make.

Um I am absolutely willing, I have an incredible amount of respect for my colleague, Councilmember Frederick.

I know that she's done a ton of work on this, and um, and it is usually my go-to to defer to somebody that's put that much work in.

Um I'm open to it, but I have to be honest with you, it is my preference to have the two percent despite the difficulty because I am so aware of how many people in this city that that difference that half percentage difference is actually going to make a difference in how they can afford their home.

And I think everyone should be aware of that, because that's something that these times have been coming for a while.

If the administration was worried about having to override the tax cap at a certain point, they could have chosen to have a quarter percent higher in the past several years.

And similar to the trash fee, it's all hitting at once this year.

We need to be a lot more gradual when we come to the fiscal impacts on our constituency, and this budget is not, and I have a lot of concerns about that.

Um, again, I fully support looking and having a good view of the future, but with every budget, as you look to the future, you have to look at your revenue, and you have to make sure it's responsible.

And uh that is my concern.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any other comments, questions?

Councilmember Conte.

Um, thank you.

And I want to commend the finance committee.

I did attend most of the meetings.

I appreciate the work you did.

Um I think uh moving forward next year.

The council does need to look at the charter in terms of uh the council's ability, which I we've talked about that a lot in the past, um, but that that's an important area to look at.

Um the property tax issue is uh the one most important to me.

It does have an impact.

Um I think uh council member Farrell really hit a lot of my concerns uh in terms of it does translate into affordability and issues in that respect.

Um I understand the problems between the two and the 2.5.

Um willing to go with a 2.5.

Uh but um I think uh as we move forward, and I think um you might find issues more challenging next year.

Um this is gonna put additional pressure on the property tax levy, um, which I I you know it's always falling back on the property tax levy, we can always increase that, but the little bits we do, uh it's like a drip trip drip, and it starts to really have it has real impacts, especially when it's combined with the other um taxing jurisdictions that we have.

The school district, I mean well, I the um the library district didn't increase this year uh because of uh declines in revenue and uh others.

So those are the the combination is what really begins to hurt uh but every little bit helps.

So moving forward, I hope I mean there really is a need to find a different source of revenue than the property tax levy.

Um there needs to be a sensitivity in terms of uh on the uh upper level government that there really impact there are real impacts there and that we need to really be uh looking at that.

So um I appreciate again the work that you you've done and trying to move forward with something uh and uh I'm okay moving forward with the two and a half percent if that's where people are.

Thank you.

Councilman Marinane.

Uh thank you, Chair, and I just want to thank the Chair of Finance for all the work uh you have done, and you know, all the countless meetings and uh again when we talk about the tax levy reduction, as especially uh uh my colleague Megan King said it.

You know, this is uh a historical election, and I think that many all of us in the city want to see the next administration succeed in uh when you think about you know whether it's uh three percent tax levy or even two point five and a half to two and a half.

Um we're talking about uh 300k plus difference, and I think that you know when we look at this tax levy, particularly for the next administration.

I want to make sure that they have all the cash at hand they can, you know, to succeed and have a successful uh first term.

So um I will be supporting the two and a half.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, so at least from comments received, it sounds like we are um favorable relatively to the 2.5 percent.

Um, just want to take a take a pulse on that.

We could just do like a hand raise to see who would support a 2.5 percent.

Okay, okay.

All right, so majority uh majority calls.

So what we will do is we will not pursue this table here, which was our attempt at a one percent reduction.

We will also not pursue the administration's proposal for the uh summary employment reduction um to get to the one percent.

We will be voting on tonight a budget inclusive of a 2.5 percent property tax, albeit a 0.5 percent reduction by the common council.

Um outside of that, I do want to discuss some other budget items with you.

So, inclusive in our ordinance, you will see a couple small items.

We had a a couple for those that joined meetings, you all are well aware, but we had a couple small movements within the common council um to address some purchases for for desk for our staff that was net neutral, so no change to budget itself, we were just moving line items.

Uh, we also had the only increase to budget, and that is very important because we were um very cognizant of this as a body.

If we were pursuing a reduction, we truly couldn't go on the opposite side and say we need increases elsewhere.

The only small nominal increase is three thousand for the city clerk.

Uh quotes were provided to update the front desk of the city clerk's office, which as you see as you walk in, it is in uh it is in need of repair, and those quotes came back three thousand above budget.

So that is the one small increase that we have.

Um, the other item that we had for discussion is related to the chief city auditors uh office.

They came in during budget season and requested a couple things a chief of staff position as well as an additional auditor position.

Ultimately, um we decided um in conversation with them that there are, and they quite frankly, the chief city auditor elect decided there's money within contracted services to move up to another position, and that they only needed approximately 90,000 within that budget line item to conduct their annual audit.

So they will be forgoing or looking to forgo any additional audits above that annual.

Um because that is their interest.

What we have done uh in discussion with the budget office in the ordinance is authorize one auditor position.

That would effectively have zero salary from our amendments, but the budget office described that um as part of ENA, the chief city auditor can go in, move contracted services to a salaried position, and that is the uh least path path of resistance for us to get there and get them another position that they're looking for.

Um the reality is there just wasn't enough funds anywhere to provide for a chief city audit or chief of staff for the city auditor.

So we're meeting uh the request in the middle and looking to add another auditor position internally.

Any questions on those changes?

Okay.

All right, so we will get this all printed.

There's some procedure we have to do to amend out of committee, changing to 2.5 and proceed forward voting on this tonight.

Thank you.

Does anyone want to discuss the uh curbside collection fee?

Thank you, Councilmember Keegan, for that.

I know I deferred that as part of the active agenda walk through.

In summary, um, we looked at the collective increase to our residents, curbside collection and property tax assessment.

Uh while we are um definitely uh concerned about doubling the fee, we also understand the necessity to offset the cost of curbside collection expenditures, and so it is a necessity to proceed forward with that doubling of the fee this year.

Uh, we do in our budget intent memo encourage future administrations to look at more gradual, smaller increases to that fee as the curbside collection increases so that the impact to our residents isn't um isn't hitting all in one particular year.

Councilmember Farrell.

Um I just wanted to reiterate what I say pretty much every time we talk about the waste side collection fee.

Um this is something that I completely agree, it should have been gradually increased, and I hope in the future it is gradually increased.

But as our dump closes, costs will go up.

And a reminder that all of the dumps in New York State will be closed in six to eleven years.

And when that happens, all of the costs of all garbage will be going up dramatically.

So this is something that it is not a question of if it should happen, it's when it will happen, and it will continue to go up.

And I will tell you, we will still be it will still be significantly cheaper than it will be if we were getting private hauling.

Um it is definitely my hope that as we look at the transfer station, we look at environmental ways to reduce our waste and encourage that in our residents because ultimately not only is it the environmental thing to do, but it will also lower costs for us dramatically down the road if we have less waste.

So this is something that I do understand that this is a lot on our constituents, especially with the tax levy increase.

Um, but that's why my focus was on the tax levy increase because I think that this is something actually it's not.

I think I know this is something that will happen regardless.

So it is um something I will be supporting, and I I highly recommend.

I know that there's some uh members that are concerned about getting flack from their constituents, and believe that it will just pass because other people will carry the water.

We all have to carry the water on this.

This is something that it is going to happen, and if we are not paying for it now, we will be paying for it at some point.

So thank you.

Councilmember Johnson.

Thank you.

It's hard listening to this when you lived in the city for the last 12 years, and you've seen uh raises, you've seen all types of spending, and now it looks like you know, uh the last um second, you know, we talk about the uh assessments, everything I've said it before, and the mayor's in here, and I'm not gonna bite my tongue.

Everything I've said it before, and the mayor's in here, and I'm not gonna bite my tongue.

This administration has not been people friendly.

Um when you look at all the hits that um um the city um residents are are um acts to carry right now, it's a lot at once.

And you know, to say it's gonna happen, it was gonna happen.

That's where leadership, that's where people who are leading the city, we expect them to be able to come up with a plan and not at the last, you know, at the last minute, say, oh, it's it's gonna happen, we can't do anything about it.

So, you know, um it's painful because the effect, it isn't the same as some of the people that are discussing it isn't the same.

The effects on some of the people making the decisions aren't the same um all over.

You know, um these uh increases are gonna be passed down to um folks, and a lot of times they're passed down with interest.

They don't just pass down at cost.

So um these decisions are are um gonna affect everybody, but um a certain group of people are are just gonna get placed out placed and out, and and and that's problematic for me because uh when we make these decisions, you know, a lot of times we get those phone calls.

I just listened to the um chief say his bill, but what that's gonna do is gonna make more people call us with their um questions and and their concerns, and and that makes more work for us.

And um, and so I I just think that our approach to how we um come up with a budget really needs to change going forward because even if you look at these cuts, you know, they've been cutting services um for uh our community for the last 12 years.

You know, services have been disappearing, um, and and um our residents notice it.

They they notice when the street sweeper doesn't come when they move their cars to the other side and they wake up in the morning and the street street sweeper didn't come, we get those phone calls.

So um some of these cuts are concerning to me because the potholes, you know, um snow removal.

If if people don't think that um people notice that um there have been cuts in how they approach um snow removal, and that um those cuts affect um people's daily uh commutes to and from work.

It's a lot that goes into it, and so I'm um I'm uh bothered when I hear words like compromise and and concern about spending when a lot of times I don't see that same um I don't see the same um scrutiny going when we're spending money.

So I just wanted to say something because it's a lot that has been passed on to the um residents, and I will say um to the mayor, she's here.

She did a good job with not raising taxes.

I don't, you know, I don't know if it's a good job.

I know people um benefited from it um for uh 12 years.

So I don't think that to not raise taxes and and and um get rewarded for that, and then at the last second say, well, we we we have to do it.

It's it's it's not a constellation to people that are gonna be um that's gonna feel the burden of of what's to come.

So as uh my colleagues said, I would love to see the next administration be in the um a healthy um spot so they can do some of the changes that the city is calling for.

But um I just I'm bothered by the way that I have seen um the spending go and and knowing that this point was coming because people talked about it.

People called that they said um tougher times were uh coming, and and all of this to hit our um residents at once.

I just think that is it's a uh it's a big swing uh for some people to have to deal with the assessment um increase to deal with um taxes, and then on top of that, we're talking about doubling the um trash fee.

So I'm uncomfortable with a lot of the um conversation tonight, and I just wanted to go on record and um making an attempt to be the voice for um people that are gonna be holding the um the brunt of this.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Johnson.

There are two other issues that we haven't gotten to yet.

We wanted to touch on ordinance 2410125, and also that's by Mr.

Clark, but then also Mr.

Clark's uh resolution on the eminent domain.

Um we had Mr.

McGee at a couple of our meetings, a couple of caucuses talking about uh what you know explaining to us the the status of the negotiations with the families over the property.

Um I guess at this point I would just say to by a show of hands.

Can I see who's okay with moving ahead with the hearing, uh passing the resolution for the hearing to move ahead with the hearing.

Okay.

For for the imminent domain.

Yeah, okay.

So yeah, that would be resolution 121-10125.

So we'll be can you add that into there?

All right, and then lastly, the the ordinance for 2410125.

I'll let you lead that discussion, Mr.

Ballarin.

Thank you, Kelly.

Uh so I I'm gonna be quick and brief because I know we've got a hectic agenda.

Uh so I uh just want to let my colleagues know I will be voting no for the proposed amendment.

Uh and I just want to make sure that uh my colleagues understand why um and the the concerns that I have with what was put in front of us this afternoon.

So one um if you vote for this option, we are very limited in what we can change.

Because this is the option that they're going to take to the county for county review and county approval.

So before it even gets to a planning committee meeting, we're very limited of what we can change if we can change anything.

Uh two.

Um this was done in a way where a lot of people were not brought in the room, uh, where you didn't have the opportunity to have back and forth.

Uh you didn't have the opportunity to have community engagement.

You didn't have the opportunity to have uncomfortable conversations.

And those uncomfortable conversations are never fun, they're never pleasant, but they make it so that people feel one that they're a part of the process, and two, people can feel more comfortable with the outcome.

Maybe they didn't get everything they wanted, but they were at least brought to the table, and maybe they were able to get some of their concerns brought on the paper.

Uh three.

This bill was brought to us in the middle of October in the middle of budget season, where the budget is in front of you today, where we have been in meetings day in and day out to address our budget.

So we didn't create this timeline, and and I'm gonna push back in the idea that we we have to get this done before the end of the year.

No, we have to get this done right.

So it will go on.

If if it's not voted on today, this will go to a planning committee meeting in that in December.

We will start the conversation, we will get community engagement, we will get community involvement, we will have those tough conversations.

I will get a lot more gray hair, but at least we'll try to come up with something that people feel somewhat comfortable with, even if they don't like it.

And and just to remind people, people didn't like this originally.

You guys remember there was people who did not like the original outcome of this on both sides.

So we can have those conversations.

Um we didn't create this problem.

This problem was well, well, well below before we got here.

Our city of two cities was well, well, whoa before we got here.

But we do have a responsibility to do what we can to fix it, and going back to what we had or going back to nothing, allowing developers to pay their way out of affordable housing.

That's not right.

I think we can do better.

I think we can be more creative.

So I'm gonna ask this council to vote no for this amendment.

Let's do the hard work.

And let's agree to disagree, but let's not be afraid of those tough conversations because it's those tough conversations and those difficult journeys that can sometimes realize we got more that we get along, and we've got more that we agree on than we disagree.

So again, um I'm I'm asking all my colleagues again to vote no for these amendments and allow us to have the conversation and really try to get this done right.

Thank you.

Thank you.

We're Mr.

Clerk.

Thank you.

Uh we'll have more discussion on this during the meeting, but just wanted to point out that the amounts that are proposed uh could be changed between the county planning referral and a potential final vote.

The vote tonight is just to allow this to move forward for further discussion.

And I want to remind this body that when it was passed, uh a lot of members said that if this does not work, that they would look at it and uh potentially change it, and that came from this body, not the next body, and so I'm asking to uh have my colleagues support this at least moving forward for further discussion this session.

Thank you.

Okay, Mr.

Adams, and then we're closing out.

Thank you.

Um I agree with council member Hyde.

Um this is something that we've been discussing as a council for several years now, trying to find incentives to address the housing problem that we have here in our city, and I don't think this is something that we need to continue to kick down the road when we have solutions and we have things that are in front of us that we can actually do, we need to actually start moving on these things and start making progress in areas of where we can.

Um so I am supportive of this and hope that other council members will be too, because we can continue to have the conversation, but we still need to enact action behind it, and this is the time to do so.

Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr.

Johnson.

So um my problem with this is that we don't have any oversight in the city.

Um people are allowed, once you pass a resolution, people are allowed to do as they um want to see.

And if you want me to consider it, I think they left out a zero.

Five thousand dollars to a developer is nothing.

Fifty thousand dollars um is something that would make me feel that would be um cautionary to a developer.

I don't think that they don't want to keep on giving out um fifty thousand dollars.

So um that that could get me to consider um this this resolution, but to put uh a low number like five thousand dollars, and we don't have any true oversight over the matter.

I just wanted to point that out.

Thank you for the time.

Thank you.

Mr.

President, turn it over to you?

Yeah, we'll call the order tonight's Albany Common Council meeting Monday, November seventeenth, twenty twenty-five.

Can the clerk please call the roll?

Adams.

Present.

Anani.

Present.

Ballorin.

Here, Clark, here Concy.

Here, Farrell, here, Frederick.

Present.

Hoey?

Here, Johnson, present.

Egan here, Kimberrow.

Here Robinson.

Here.

Zamer.

Here.

Fifteen present.

Thank you.

Um, will you please rise with me and say the Pledge of Allegiance, and after that, a moment of silence.

One nation.

I'm the guy.

Individual with liberty and justice law.

Before we move on to our next item of agenda, which will be our public hearing, um, we do have the mayor uh here tonight, and the mayor would like to address the council.

Um, so we call up Mayor Kathy Shane so she can address the council.

Thank you.

Um appreciate the opportunity to address this council.

I want to uh congratulate each of you who have won re-election or new offices, and for those who decided not to run for re-election, I wish you all the best.

Maybe we can get together and have a toast for those of us who are leaving city service, but who will I know continue to do incredible things for the city of Albany.

I also want to thank this council for its thoughtful consideration of the budget that we proposed.

There are really challenging times that we face, and I know that particularly the increase in the trash fee was a lot that we threw at you.

And as I said when I presented the budget, that's on us, and I know that it is difficult, and that most of you recognize that it's necessary.

Yes, costs have increased, yes, salaries have increased, but I'm proud of the fact that they've increased the most for those who were our lowest earners in the city.

Because of the urging of this council, we undertook an in-depth salary study and we looked at what we were paying people, and we are now competitively paying individuals, and those who receive the biggest rate raises were those who were at the lowest end of the earning spectrum.

And when we think about the fact that our trash collection costs have doubled in the last several years, that's because we have been able to give raises to our sanitation workers again among our lowest paid employees in the past.

And so that is because of the work of this council and my administration together, recognizing that we have to pay people fairly, and that we cannot be part of the problem, that we have to have a minimum wage, that we have to pay a living wage.

And so, yes, the cost of that is borne by our taxpayers.

And when I think about city services, I am proud of the fact that we have invested more than a hundred million dollars in roads, parks, and sidewalks.

People, nobody likes potholes, but people can look at the numbers, and I can assure you we are filling more potholes today and paving more roads today than we did 12 years ago.

We have more sweepers today than we had 12 years ago.

We are about to cut the ribbon on a new community center in West Hill, and in the spring you will be celebrating the opening of a brand new Hoffman Community Center, a community center that was an embarrassment, and that this administration worked hard to focus on bringing something that the community could truly be proud of in the South E.

We rebuilt the Lincoln Park pool, a pool that the prior administration was going to close.

And so those are all investments that yes, they do impact the cost of city services, but we are providing, I believe, outstanding services in the neighborhoods that in the past did not see or benefit from this type of investment.

And so I look forward to seeing what those investments are going to produce in the years to come.

If I had raised taxes within the CAP every year of my administration, the average taxpayer in this city would be paying 1,100 more in property taxes today.

And so while this 3% tax increase was one that this council discussed and sought to reduce, I do believe that you will need every penny of it.

I respect the compromise that you have reached, but for 11 dollars on a $300,000 assessment, I believe that for our residents, that $11, and that's not $11 a month, that's $11 on a house that's assessed at $300,000.

That $11 savings is a risk that you are taking when compared to what you may have to cut if there's a revenue shortfall.

But we are not leaving with no plan of action.

We are actively looking at pursuing a hotel tax occupancy tax for the city.

Some other cities have gone ahead of us.

It was hard fought in Buffalo, and it's been hard fought in some other places, but we believe that there's a revenue source there, and I think that we have to take a hard look at some other uh revenue opportunities.

So I agree that we do need to do more for our residents and for our taxpayers, but I am also proud of what we've been able to accomplish.

And I also am proud of the fact that we have built thousands of units of new affordable housing for our lowest income most vulnerable residents over the last 12 years.

I was also proud of the fact that we were building market rate housing so that we could attract individuals into our city and help for those who are wanting to stay here to be able to stay here so that we could have mixed income neighborhoods in this city.

And as well intentioned and heartfelt, the advocacy, both in this room in this council, and among advocates who are advocating for affordable housing, as as much as I share that passion, the formula isn't working.

And it is beyond time.

It has been two and a half years.

Two and a half years.

So no, it is not interest rates.

No, it it it is not any of the things that people want us to think that it is.

It is that the formula isn't right.

And I think it's important for us to look one another in the eye and say, we didn't get it right, but we have an opportunity to level set and revisit.

But if we don't get moving on incentivizing middle class market rate housing in the city of Albany, we will continue to see our communities experience higher and higher concentrations of poverty, and we will continue to hear people say that they don't have access to the types of amenities that they want in their neighborhoods, like grocery stores and retail and other amenities.

We can do both.

We did do both.

And so I think that it is past time.

This is something that I talked about in my state of the city two years ago.

I talked about it again in my state of the city.

I've sent you letters, I've shown you numbers, we have looked at the data, and now our chief city auditor has conducted an audit.

And not surprisingly, the initial results of that audit appear to confirm that the changes that were made are preventing market rate housing from being built in the city of Albany.

And so it is time to have those difficult conversations, but I think it is also beyond time for us to do what we can for every resident in the city and for the future of this city.

If we grow our tax base, then we can provide relief in property taxes to our residents.

If we grow our tax base and grow our population, we can attract the amenities and the businesses that support this community.

And so I want to make it very clear.

And if I believed that the changes that were made to inclusionary zoning were working and allowing us to do that, I would be here talking about the thousands of new units of housing being built.

But I am not.

And so we owe it to our residents and to the future of this city to work on adjusting, and there will always be opportunities as new ideas, as new incentives, as new opportunities come down the road for us to be able to take advantage of that.

I have confidence in this body.

I have confidence in the next administration that they will continue to fight the same fight to ensure that we are helping everyone in this community and that we are moving our community forward.

And I know that each and every one of you, in total sincerity, and hard work and dedication, do all that you can to represent those who elected you.

And for that, I commend you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, for that.

Um I just want to say this before we call up for the public hearing, and just to reiterate, I was at the budget meeting the other day as well.

And um I thank Mr.

Gallan for pointing out the increase in the um in the trash fee, you know, COVID had hit.

And so once COVID hit, things changed, so we weren't able to explanation was the city, you know, we were dealing with other issues, so it wasn't able to be gradual, and that's why we see ourselves uh with this trash hit at once.

So we understand uh the residents how they how they might feel, but there was things in between that prevented that gradual uh increase in the budget.

And uh also, you know, I spoke and I said there's two things that uh from being on the council that I really felt like we government had gotten it right, and that was during our COVID uh when we teamed up together to really hold the line on both sides and look at cuts that we might we might have had to make.

But we held the line.

And the second thing was the increase of salaries across the city.

And for the city and this council to come together to figure out what those ranges would be and increase those salaries, and at and at the same time not increasing taxes and keeping taxes at a minimum.

Those two things I was so proud to see the city government elect officials working for the people.

And so when you look at this tax increase now, um, council members, you know, they did what you did what you could.

Um but we got to be mindful of that.

We've held taxes and stuff down for a while.

Uh and uh, you know, we the future is unknown.

Um we know there's some tough times ahead, but when you look at this budget and you look at uh the things we've done in the past, that's a council, uh as the mayor stated with our parks and things of that nature.

Um you guys should be very proud of what you've done.

Um yes, some constituents might feel a certain way about the increase, but we've held spending uh down for a long time in the city.

So you know, don't beat yourself up over it.

Um we understand constituents, you know, citizens are going to have their say, which is okay, um, but you will continue to work on it and continue to work on it even after tonight.

So with that being said, I would like to start our public comment period, public hearing, not public comment.

And the public hearing is different than the public comment period.

During the public hearing, you can only talk about and address the public hearing notice of that issue.

You cannot address any other thing but that.

So we have one, two, three, four public hearings on four different issues.

Um, you will have five minutes to speak upon the public hearing issue.

Uh, and after that, unlike public comment, after that, if council members have questions for you, they can ask you questions during a public hearing.

Public comment that is not.

So, with that being said, we're gonna start with the we're gonna have the clerk read the first public hearing.

Notices hereby given that a common council public hearing will be held on November 17, 2025 at 7 p.m.

It will be held in advance of the potential passage of the following ordinance.

This meeting will be an in-person meeting in the common council chambers, city hall, and will be held on the following matters.

Ordinance 2062-24, an ordinance amending section 357-74, establishments of the residential parking permit system of chapter 359, vehicles and traffic of the code of the city of Albany in relation to modifying the boundaries of the residential parking permit system.

Is there anyone signed up for that public hearing?

No.

Is anyone here want to speak upon that ordinance?

Seeing none, we'll deem that public hearing closed.

Uh next.

Ordinance 16, 8225, an ordinance amending chapter 375, unify sustainable sustainable development ordinance of the code of the city of Albany in relation to non-conformity um determination process.

Do we have any questions?

No one signed up for that one.

Is there anyone who would like to speak upon that public hearing?

Thank you.

Just state your name for the record and city, town, where you live, you know, I know where you live, but good evening.

My name is Karen Kaniff.

I live in Albany.

Um, and I just need to clarify.

I called the council today, got an answering machine, and said I would like to speak.

Um, this is one of the things I wanted to speak on, but I have other things.

Can I come back and speak on them also?

Yes.

Okay.

So you were calling for ordinance 1682 25.

Am I correct?

So that's the non-conformity determination process.

I have been in other council meetings, and I brought it to your attention that I thought there was a problem with this because this uh amendment was to correct things that were left out of the zoning process when the USGO came into being in Albany.

And when I was reading it, it was saying that there would be no public comment.

Um I have to like rephrase that.

They were trying to bring properties that no longer fit the code, fit the zoning code for that area.

And so that would just be taken away from the process of neighbors saying, but it's now a six-family.

It used to be a one-family, and they would not have a say in that happening.

And if that is the case, I think that it's incorrect to deny the public comment.

And I thought that perhaps it was unconstitutional to deny public comment to its citizens if they have property, and the next door neighbor has made it a multifamily.

That person should have a say in what they're living next to.

So unless that has been corrected, you should not pass this amendment to deny the public a comment on something that affects their finances, their taxes, etc.

So please do not silence the public, and don't vote for this if that is the case.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any questions?

No.

Thank you.

No.

Pardon me, Ms.

Damer?

This is Alfredo.

This is uh council member Ballarins.

Yes.

Okay.

No.

Thank you.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

We have no other people persons signed up for the ordinance 1682 20.25R.

And so we will that uh public hearing will be closed.

Uh next ordinance.

Ordinance 1991-25, an ordinance amending chapter 375 unify sustainable development ordinance of the code of the city of Albany in relation to music at sidewalk or outdoor cafes.

Is it anyone signed up for this public hearing?

Not at this time.

Since there's no one signed up, no one wishes to speak.

We'll deem this public hearing closed.

Moving on, next public hearing.

Ordinance 2710125, an ordinance adopting the City of Albany's budget for fiscal year 2026 as presented by the mayor on October 1st, 2025.

We have anyone signed up for this public hearing.

Yes.

First person is Carl Yorick.

Thank you.

Carl Yurick, Lennox Avenue.

Albany.

Great.

So thanks for members of uh the common council uh for having us here today.

I'll be speaking about the 2026 proposed budget.

Um, you know, a a quick comment up front.

Uh this is my first time participating in the budget development.

And it's taken about three weeks for me to realize who really holds the power in the budgeting process.

It's pretty sad.

You know, we we have a budget process that's an executive branch-driven process.

We come here, we speak, uh, yell a bit in the public comment period, we express our concerns and and to what purpose.

It would really be great if the the mayor's office or whoever actually owns the budget process.

Some other person, you know, if if those were people were actually here and held public meetings to gather public feedback, instead, we have to come to the common council, which is probably in the end pretty low value.

Anyway, having reviewed and analyzed the budget.

I shared some of that analysis with the common council in a previous discussion and via email.

I have some beliefs on what the city needs to do with this budget.

2026 is gonna be really rough in in a lot of ways.

And and from all the data that I'm seeing, this this budget needs cuts on the order of four to six million dollars of general expenditures and cuts of four to five million dollars of debt-driven expenditures from our 2026 capital improvement program.

And and yeah, I get it.

Those are those are big numbers, big big numbers.

So what I want to do is I want to walk through 10 things that I believe are true, that I believe the data supports.

And you can follow along and see which of these ten things you agree with or disagree with, and feel free to ask me questions later.

So let me just go in order here.

No particular order.

Number one, uh city currently has an unsustainable level of debt and liabilities, and we must do everything possible to not increase these debts and liabilities.

Number two, the city has an over dependency on state funding as our primary source of new revenue.

We celebrate every year we become more dependent.

Number three, the city has issues creating new revenue streams that are material and long-term sustainable.

These are the fees, the citation revenues, et cetera.

We heard a perfect example where we're now grasping for things like hotel taxes to plug the gap.

Number four, the New York State controllers fiscal stress monitoring systems shows our city has moderate stress right now.

And from my analysis, I conclude there's a strong likelihood of that worsening to a level of significant stress within two years based on our current trajectory.

Number five, the city's 2026 revenue lines for non-state and non-reimbursement revenue streams contain four to six million dollars of revenue that is best described as speculative or at risk.

You may recall I sent you an email that scorecards this speculative revenue.

Number seven, sorry, number six, the city's 2026 state funding revenue growth contains a $700,000 funding increase, which should be considered speculative or at risk given macroeconomic conditions.

Number seven, uh the city is not materially added to our property tax base in the form of new residential construction in the last five years, and there's little to suggest that this will improve.

Where we've added housing, it's not materially growing our tax base.

Great that we are adding housing, it's not adding to our tax, you know, our property tax base.

Number eight, our city's five-year capital improvement plans 2026 in the out years will grow our debt at an unsustainable rate if we play them out.

Number nine, city's budget provides little to no explanation that justifies the growth in any line item.

And number 10, any top line and bottom line relief that comes from the championing Albany's potential initiative is six to ten years away.

The CAP pro program is not going to save us from making tough decisions now.

So I I get it.

You know, budget cuts of these sizes that I'm suggesting are difficult decisions in difficult times.

Making cuts impacts people and programs that provide value now and in the future.

But not making cuts, not making difficult decisions now will impact citizens and taxpayers at a great greater level in the future.

Happy to answer any questions related to that.

New questions from council members.

You referenced that the budget uh should be public and people should be able to come and we do have finance budget hearings of every department that is posted, every department head comes in front of the council, and the public is able to come and look at that department's budget during those meetings.

So that is public that does happen during the budget process.

Fair point.

Uh that is a common council-driven process and not a citizen-driven QA process.

So maybe I I should have made the distinction a little more clear there.

I'd like to be uh able to ask a question of a budget director.

I just wanted to make sure you knew that that's the same.

Every department does come in the citizens can come and ask questions uh at that at that time.

Thank you, Mr.

Ellis.

Uh thank you, Mr.

President.

Thank you, Mr.

Uh York.

I appreciate your coming.

Uh I appreciated your speaking at the first hearing we had.

I wish we we could do more.

Uh but um not to repeat, but yeah, we do have limitations on what we can do.

So I'm gonna ask you, and I don't know if you can answer that question, but uh do you have experience in terms of other municipalities that maybe have a budget process where their local legislative body has more authority than we do, and if so, I mean that that may be models for us to look at because one thing I think we do need to look at in the future, or the council needs to look at, I won't be here, but the council needs to look at, and we've discussed that in the past is how do we uh increase our authority so we do have an impact.

Yeah, uh unfortunately, sadly, I have no experience in that area.

I I wish I had you know the the model of you know, go talk to Yonkers or go talk to East Greenbush or whatever, uh, but unfortunately I don't.

I apologize.

Danke for your comments.

Um, just wanted to ask you, um, you spoke about your projections in terms of the city's financial position, and just wanted to ask what method or um what type of methodology are you using to get to those either numbers or get to um those comments that you made.

Yep.

Yeah, I mean I mean a lot of it uh you know when we look at um revenue, expenditures, uh the the projection of of debt and and how our debt will grow and how we paid down debt.

I mean a lot of that is just like grabbing money from uh from our debt reports and plugging in Excel and and you know, looking at their trajectory.

Um in terms of um item number uh four, which is looking at the controllers uh stress monitoring system.

Uh that that was just a uh a matter of looking at the the controllers kind of rubric for how they calculate the uh the stress level and just kind of playing out what our numbers are likely to be, and uh it's pretty easy to say, you know, hey, if we go above this number, then we get docked X number of points, et cetera.

I I'd be happy to share any of any of that uh information if you had um I think you have my email address, so you can feel free to shoot me a note and I'd be happy to share any of that.

Yes, thank you.

I think I didn't read through your email priority for, but um again, just wanted to understand the methodology, obviously, uh when it comes to the financial concern of the city.

Um we all have our own opinions about it, um, but being able to um look at the projection of that um was my concern as to what were you looking at compared to maybe what our budget director and other people in-house um look at um while making up the budget.

But again, just want to thank you for your comments and appreciate it.

Thank you.

And you know, I I would say that a lot of this this need for cuts is really underpinned by the email I sent you regarding our revenue projections.

You know, you saw I don't I don't have an exact number in there, but you know, it would be like, hey, here's a line item where we where we earned a hundred thousand dollars in twenty twenty four, and in twenty twenty-six we expect to earn three hundred and ninety thousand dollars.

I mean, numbers that either don't make sense at all, they're illusory, or maybe they are real, but you know, sort of throw a bone and and give an explanation of of why they are are real.

I mean, most of the the stress that I see associated with the budget is is based on you know revenue that you know, I'd better die at Coke is is not gonna uh appear in 2026.

One more.

Um you did also mention a comment about the capital projects, I think.

Can you speak to that a little bit more as to um your opinion about that as to how that may have you know put us in a position and if you think that is something that the city should continue to either uh move away from over this next couple of years as to you know very expensive projects?

Yeah, and you know, and in very very broad brush, I would say we've we've we've had a lot of of uh debt financing over the last few years.

No criticism.

I mean, what's done is done.

We've we've bought whatever we bought and we took on debt for for whatever we we did end up buying.

Um, in broad strokes, it you know, we're we're at a time where we we can't pay off debt faster than we're taking it on based on looking at uh based on looking at two things.

One is the capital improvement program at is as it exists now, and the capital improvement program based on our historical behaviors.

You know, if you look at our any of our five-year CIPs, you can go back five years.

We seem to say, again, broad strokes, hey, we're gonna spend a lot of money this upcoming year, but in the out years, year two, three, four, and five, we'll sort of tone it down and and not take on as much debt.

Another year happens, we crank up the debt again for the current year.

We we promise then the out years will be better, and so we have this behavior that just is I don't know, self-reinforcing or something like that.

We're just taking on too much debt, and and it's okay for us to throttle that back for a year, push some stuff out where uh where possible.

Thank you.

Mr.

Ballard, thank you, Mr.

President.

Um thank you for your insight and your your uh input.

Um I think bullet point three was that we struggled with new revenue.

Yeah.

Um can you just go into that a little bit more of how uh where you did where you feel we can do better?

And in all your research, what have you seen that others have done to try to improve uh bringing in new revenue uh for the city?

Yeah, so um yeah, I can I could probably for talk prial on for an hour about this.

I mean, on what we should be doing, what we should be doing, you know, I I I probably don't agree with the lay the mayor on a lot of things, but I would agree on two things that she said.

One is um the data suggests, and I agree as an independent observer that the inclusive housing policy uh suppresses to some degree uh the development of our housing.

Second thing is we we have no money in our budget.

I mean, we we need to grow ourselves out of this this hole we're in.

One housing unit at a time that goes on the tax rules, you know, uh uh a red X house that becomes inhabitable, uh a vacant lot that that gets a manufactured house built on it, uh duplex, triplex, etc.

I mean, and and that's where we should be putting our budgetary bets.

There's no new money in the budget to support the development of housing.

There are literally two dozen things that we could be spending money on that in sense housing across every single economic strata.

That is the best way for us, in my opinion, for us to grow ourselves out of the hole.

You know, in terms of uh what did I put here?

Um, you know, we have issues creating revenue streams that are material and long-term sustainable.

I mean, the poster child for this is the school bus camera program.

We project six, we're probably gonna get like two and a half, so then in 2025, so next year we predict we're gonna make four, but we're probably not gonna make like two and a half again.

So, you know, we we and then we try to find these things like hotel taxes, fees and stuff like that.

I mean, it's just not a material sustainable thing, and and honestly, we're pretty bad at projecting what those revenues will amount to.

So I don't know.

I hope I tried to answer both of your questions, sir.

I guess I was just curious what what have other city cities done to bring in new revenue, like develop housing.

Develop housing that goes on the tax roll as fast as possible.

So housing that goes in the tax rule as soon as possible.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Ms.

Frederick.

Mr.

Yark, thank you for your comments this evening.

As always, I think you come with a uh a plethora of information for us, and you really dive into the details.

Um I do agree we have limited control as the common council for budget adjustments, uh, but I have to respectfully disagree that this process is not for naught.

Uh we do bring transparency to our city residents on the budget.

We go department by department and we really look line by line and bring justification to any adjustments that we see.

And we're also making changes tonight.

Uh while sentiment was shared earlier that an $11 uh decrease to taxes is not impactful.

Every dollar counts for our residents.

So we have the ability to make some changes, and tonight we're going to do that with the property tax.

Uh my question for you is one of your concerns is related to our debt.

Um, are you aware that we are not past or we're not voting on our bond ordinances this evening because we want to have a deeper conversation with our treasurer and our administration on our overall debt.

So um, so first of all, I I apologize if any of my comments were hyper hyperbolic, I I uh and uh and and certainly I realize that there is value into a process.

I don't think there's as much value as there could be in in sort of the vetting of the budget process.

No, I'm not aware of that, and I would say yes, that is an awesome thing to drill in a little bit to our sort of long-term debt bands and what are we actually buying.

And you know, to me, a pivotal question would be it, you know, uh has anyone explored what we can push off in terms of uh you know, debt financed projects.

And we'll notice that meeting shortly, and I do encourage you to to join us during that session.

Thank you very much for making me a work.

Thank you, Ms.

Farrell and then Mr.

Holy.

Um I just wanted to thank you so much for your diligent feedback.

As as I went through the budget process, I actually would go through your annotated notes on the entire budget book before every presentation.

Um so it was very much appreciated.

And um I I just wanted to say that it is not always the most exciting thing, the budget, so it is especially appreciative when we have members, there are several other members in the audience um that have been paying attention and have been providing feedback, and I know all of the council members really appreciate it and and definitely use that.

So while the budget process could be, there's a lot of things that could happen within it, we do have a very robust budget process, and I do know that I personally use feedback from people and bring it when I ask questions, and I know my colleagues do the same.

So while there's not always a direct opportunity as representatives, we do it is part of our job to ask the questions that our constituents bring us.

And um, and that is something that I think all of us take as uh sacred.

And I also just wanted to note that if everybody has been enjoying um the different things that you've been sharing, they also could look to the your website, Albany Data Stories, where you get into detail with a lot of different things.

Um you didn't give the plug for it, and I just thought that I would do it for you because it's it's really there's a ton of information.

It's I highly recommend people look it over.

Um my colleagues and anybody that might be in the audience or listening.

So thank you.

Thank you very much, and thanks for providing sort of insight into what happens behind the scenes that I don't have visibility on.

Mr.

Holy?

Oh, thank you, and uh thank you for your comments.

Um I just got a fast question or and I'm I'm still trying to figure this out because a lot of people say this that we gotta grow our way out of our shortages.

Now, if we grow, in my mind, you know, you say 10,000 new housing units, people are gonna move into those housing units, people are gonna have children in those housing units.

Our school system is pretty much maxed out.

Um we're gonna need we're gonna have 10,000 more people, we're gonna have uh a more need for uh public safety, fire, police, ambulance, um, road repairs, because now there's more traffic and more people driving.

So does growth always mean that that's the for any municipality that the only way we can survive is to grow?

Because if we look at a piece of bread that you leave out and yeast starts growing on it, eventually keeps growing and eventually the bread's gone.

And I always think, you know, we don't think that we're the same way.

How much can we support what is the right level?

And I'm just curious if you've looked at that.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So certainly the the negatives that happen to growth are when we do uh IDA based growth, where we give long tax exemptions, property tax, school tax exemptions, and then we you know, every housing unit, I think like on average has 0.3 students that enter uh that enter the school system, and and when we give away uh property tax exemptions through IDA IDA builds, we we don't have the the school tax financing and and we're immediately underwater.

Um smart growth where we're adding people, you know.

The great thing is the infrastructure is already there.

There's very little, yes, we'll have to maintain certain infrastructure, and that will come with a little bigger cost, but we don't need to build new infrastructure, new roads.

And uh, you know, you put 10 houses on Lexington Ave uh in vacant spots or tear down X buildings and rebuild uh buildings like the infrastructure is already there, and and there is a leap of faith that you have to take that while you know you you're you're you will see some added costs from from growth that the added revenue and added benefit uh greatly exceeds uh exceeds that and there are there are certainly case studies of that we can share on that.

Um I mean Detroit would be a I mean, certainly Albany's not Detroit, but Troy would be a great example of of growth uh rebuilding a city.

Thank you.

And you know, I you talked about infrastructure in my ward, um, one of the things we're lacking is sidewalks.

I've brought this up um seven seven years, nine months.

Um we don't have sidewalks, our kids can't walk to school safely.

You know, in the winter time you can't go on, and you know, so we do have infrastructure needs in different parts of the city, and it'd be interesting.

One of the things I just got to give you an aside.

Um I'm I wanted to know each ward what the tax space for each ward is, how much money each ward contributes in, and uh the next step would be then how much gets spent, and I was told no, you can't answer, you can't ask that question.

I actually went to the treasurer, they couldn't figure it out.

So I don't know if there's a way to do that, but it'd be interesting study.

Thank you.

There is, and and we've done uh uh like a block by block like you know, tax value per acre analysis.

We haven't released that yet, but it really shows that kind of counterintuitively the places that you would expect are like the most valuable for the city in terms of tax return, are actually the you know the areas around here, you know, West, Arbor Hill, South End, you know, Pine Hills, it's et cetera, uh houses close together uh with with you know average size, uh average size tax loads.

We need more of that uh housing.

Thank you, Mr.

Holy.

Ms.

Zaniman.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I'll be brief.

I I don't know if you expected all these questions, but I did not.

But um I think we find you fascinating and and your your analysis has been really interesting and useful to all of us, and um just because I'm your representative, and I'm lucky that you're in in my ward, but um, you really your insights have really been valuable.

My quick question is in if you've analyzed um other municipalities of similar size, do you also take into account the high percentage of tax exempt property that we have as a capital city, which is 6% eight or four or seven or whatever, mid-sixty percent.

Um when you sort of, and I don't mean you know, you you're critical of our dependence on state aid, but how else would you envision us making up for the fact that the state owns so much of our yeah, I I mean I I hate to sound like a broken record, but our our our path is to grow our way out of this.

We have 2,000 undeveloped properties, we have 800 Redux buildings, we have you know great opportunities to put in duplexes, triplexes, you know, just every single housing type across every socioeconomic class.

And um, you know, the the our our 68 percent is 68 percent or whatever the number is.

I mean, that ain't changing, so we need we need to figure out the the best way to navigate around that.

I mean, yes, we can get money from the state as as sort of uh compensation, I suppose.

Uh but beyond that, our our path is to grow our housing.

Period.

Thank you.

Yep.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Please call the next speaker.

Maureen Macaulay.

Um Maureen McCauley, Albany, New York.

I was here during a prior budget public comment period.

Several people, including our our last speaker and me spoke about the need for reconciling revenue projections with reality, justifying increases, and taking the uncertain macroeconomic climate into consideration, all for the purpose of ensuring transparency, accountability, and that the taxpayers get what they deserve, which is they have a right to know how and why their money is being spent and that it's being spent efficiently.

I thought when we left this meeting that a template had been provided, and that there would be following this, a very rigorous vetting of every increase in spedding.

Um I don't I don't see that rigor.

Let me tell you, I just spent three hours last week uh watching the YouTube version of the 1110 budget hearing.

And as I was watching it, it was really fascinating.

I was making notes and I was commenting, and I thought maybe you would I would share some of those comments with you.

Um my overall comment was a full-time communications director, or two or three, is the hot ticket item for department heads um list-wise.

And it's understandable.

Who wouldn't want somebody who is an expert in communication to tell people what was meant to be said.

However, budget-wise, that's not such a great idea.

I think there's a better way to do it.

But that was not explored.

Uh I have one concern or or several after the mayor's office presentation.

Beyond the fact that it was a 50% increase in in staff, and it was going to raise the budget for that office from 800,000 to 1.7 million.

And that has to do with the full-time position of a deputy mayor.

It appeared to me, and and I think this needs to be vetted before the budget is voted on.

It appears to me that there's a conflict um in law between a full-time funded position of a deputy mayor and what the charter says about deputy mayors.

And and this was um amplified for me when I found the local law G of 2024, which never made it out of committee, but it was the same concern.

It seemed like there was a desire for transparency and process in this this mayor, because the crux, the crux of the um charter is it's temporary.

The whole thing is very time-limited.

It's not like you always have an understudy, you always have somebody.

No, it's time to and the people who have held that position in the last 12 years all had regular city titles, and then as needed, would fill the whatever was needed for for a couple of days.

And besides that, um, it seems that that practice that Mayor Sheehan's office used for 12 years, which saved money by not having by using people who were already in the office to be this this designee, um, worked.

It worked very well.

And I didn't, I wouldn't detect that that anybody was being overstressed or in unfair labor practices, there was none of that.

Um, another position that is also of concern is the council to the mayor, specifically designated for the mayor.

It seems to me that this could also present uh a conflict due to you know, just potential who are you representing questions.

One minute remaining.

Yeah.

Did you have a question?

Oh, okay.

Um directors of communications.

I was very impressed with the elected mayor's presentation during that.

I am I'm sure you all were too.

She came across as a very smart, engaging speaker, adept at communication, and I wondered if the public would prefer hearing from her directly instead of somebody who processes communication through a couple of layers, and it doesn't sound like her at all.

I was thinking maybe X, maybe X would work for that.

Um I don't think anybody can communicate in the style that she can.

The star of this YouTube three-hour video was the corporation council.

This office came across as efficient.

Um, they were very impressive, and they also are they bring in revenue, and they had a flat budget.

Yes, your time is up, ma'am.

Okay, I'm sorry.

Close up your does anyone have any questions?

Sorry.

All right, thank you so much.

Thank you.

Clerk, please call the next speaker.

Karen Kaniff.

Are you do you have any other comments on the budget?

Um presenters that are right, thank you.

Last speaker, uh Keith Irish.

Mr.

President.

Just a point of clarification that local LG is still on the agendas for the record.

It's still it hasn't gone away.

Good evening, members of the common council present.

My name is Keith Irish, a lifelong city resident currently in the ninth ward.

I'm here tonight at this hearing on the proposed 2026 city budget before you vote on it later tonight with recommendations and changes to the original version worked on at the various finance committee meetings held over the last six weeks that very few of you attended.

If there has been changes or amendments made since the last finance meeting last Thursday, please excuse me as not knowing what they could be.

It appears that you are okay with elected officials, including yourselves getting an average 15% pay increase, claiming it hasn't been done in eight years.

But other salary increases for upper management in various agencies are also in line to get raises.

Yet those that do all the work are basically getting no increases.

But I have heard, but I haven't heard of any pro proposal to address the issue annually to adjust the fee to be more in line with what the trash fee is intended to do.

I've also heard nothing about any incentives that could be imposed on the residents to meet the goals of extending the landfill life, such as, but by no means limited to mandating clear trash bags to be used to see which residents are not doing their part in recycling or making sure that every house or up to four apartments in a building have their own recycling bin and making that a requirement on rental properties that part of their occupancy permit requires that they have those recycling bins on property for the tenants to use, as well as a list of other recycling measures within the city.

It appears that to soften the trash increase, you are trying to lower the property tax increase from 3% to 2%.

I heard in order to do that, about a $630,000 decrease would be required in the total budget.

Gee, I wonder where that could be cut.

Well, let's start with the six of the of the proposed new positions to be added to the mayor's staff.

That's about $561,000 right there.

And the raises to the rest of the existing positions would make it a total of about $614,000.

Several other agencies are also requesting new management positions, which should easily be able to make up the other $16,000 and then some.

There are various ways to trim and cut, but it appears you are trying to pad the issues by hiding them.

I could be more specific, but I only have five minutes of free speech public comment.

Speaking of free speech issues, once again, you are ignoring your civil duties to provide a more robust and required free speech avenue by not increasing the funding for the city's community media cable access channels, commonly referred to as Channel Albany.

But note that there are three specific channels, including the government channel, which should not only be showing all your meetings on, but other city departments that have public meetings that most citizens know nothing about, such as, but not again limited to all three sections of the planning department, the housing authority, the Port of Albany District Commission, the Water Board, the Border Department, sorry, and various other small agencies, boards, or commissions that hold regular public meetings, yet the public does not know about or are able to attend because they are scheduled at times when the public cannot attend them.

As I stated last year, 2026 would be a year to regret with the budget for Channel Albany, but you ignored my warnings and now can't see the light.

The budget director said at a meeting that the amounts of time have been typical for public access, which of course is far from the truth.

The cost of free speech is based on the franchise fee on residents' cable bills and not a part of the city budget.

And as such should entirely be going to the operational needs of the community channels and not being hidden in a line item under the treasurer's budget, which should be itemized.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any questions, Mr.

Flynn?

Point of clarification.

Due to the fact that we have uh Facebook live, I was able to not attend all the meetings, but I did watch interview them on my own time.

Thank you.

And also a point of clarification.

You did ask about the trash fee.

Um, and the trash fee goes to pay for the collection of trash.

Um that was stated at one of at the finance committee by uh David Gallon.

Um, and I believe the total amount is still below what it costs to uh render our trash program.

So that's what the trash fee goes towards.

It's to fund our trash system.

And it's still, I think a million dollars uh less than what we need to sorry, two million dollars less 200,000 less than what we need to fund it.

So that's what the trash fee goes for.

It goes for the cost of picking up our trash in the city of all.

And also, I like a point of order as well.

Um gentlemen, because we hear this all the time about these red X's on our buildings.

Um, as a person who 16 years ago got on this council uh campaigning on a vacant and banded buildings and change of banded buildings ordinance.

Vacant the red buildings, the red X's, the city does not own them.

They are owned by most of them are either vacant or abandoned.

There's two different things.

Vacant means there's some person paying, some entity is paying property taxes on that building.

City just can't do anything with it.

We just can't take it.

We just they're paying their property tax.

The other one is abandoned, where they're not paying property tax.

Then there's a long process of that building going through process and then hopefully go to the uh Albany um county land bank.

So I just want residents to understand uh if the city had if the city could just you know renovate those buildings, we I'm pretty sure there'd be a plan to do that.

So it's not that simple.

Uh and I just want residents to understand that when they because we hear it all the time.

Do something with the vacant red buildings.

Well, we don't own most of them.

Um, they're owned by someone else.

So just for a point of clarification.

Ms.

Fredericks.

Thank you, Mr.

Irish, for your comments and for always attending our meetings.

You're one of the um one of the city residents that showed up to every single finance committee meeting.

So I appreciate your diligence and your commitment to our city.

All but one.

All but one.

Thank you.

Um, one of your comments was related to uh essentially not looking towards waste reduction options.

And I just want to um bring awareness to our budget intent memo, being that in collaboration with Councilmember Conte, we have um language in here urging the administration to explore incentive-based strategies to promote race reduction, including enhanced household resource separation of recyclables and reduced reliance on non-recyclable packaging.

We also encourage evaluating credit mechanisms against curbside collections for those that do compost and ultimately looking to re-examine our re-examine our recycling contracts to ensure we have competitive rates for recyclable materials.

So that is something that I know this body is passionate about, and the future body uh will definitely look to work with the administration on addressing.

And I'm glad to hear that, and I I that's why I wanted to bring up the point for sure, because it seems like there was always talk about you know what to do, but how to try to prevent some of the uh the trash needed to be picked up or how it was picked up.

So that's the only reason really why I made that point, but your points are you know very valid.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Dyer's.

Thank you for uh participating.

Uh that is the last speaker on the budget, and that is the last public hearing uh item, and this public hearing is being closed.

Now we'll move on to public comment period.

Public comment period.

You have five minutes to talk about any subject you wish to speak upon.

Uh that time you state your name and location that you live.

Um, unlike public hearing, afterwards, council members cannot answer ask you any questions.

Uh if council members choose to address anything you said, they will choose to do that at another time during the meeting.

So, with that being said, can the clerk please call the first speaker?

Peter Damon, good evening, members of the Albany Common Council and other city's officials.

My name is Isabella Kakushko, and I am a paralegal at Lemerie Greysler.

I assist attorney Peter Damon, representing Manfred and Mary Ann Simon and the Simon Trust, owners of 502, 504, and 506 Rap Road North, which I will refer to as the subject property.

I'm here tonight speaking in attorney Damon's place.

Our comments concern resolution 121.101.25R authorizing a public hearing on the City of Albany's proposed eminent domain taking of the subject property for construction of a solid waste transfer station.

It is our understanding that the hearing could be set as soon as December 15th, 2025.

The subject property has been in the Simon family since the early 1950s when the Simons' parents when Mr.

Simon's parents and relatives built their homes.

During their residency, they lived adjacent to the City of Albany landfill located at 525 Wrap Road North.

For more than half a century, the family has lived next to the landfill without complaint, without litigation, and with consistent cooperation.

Mr.

and Mrs.

Simon were approached earlier this year by the city to discuss this acquisition, and it appears plans for a waste transfer station have been in the works.

In 2024, the city published a request for proposals for development of a waste transfer station.

The city did not accept a bid but still went forward with conducting appraisals of the subject property.

Notably, these appraisals did not include a highest and best use analysis, which is fundamental in determining fair market value.

Around that time, the parties entered into a right of first refusal agreement and were willing to consider an extension to give additional time and flexibility.

However, shortly after the city provided these appraisals, it quickly shifted to the threat to condemn and press forward.

In conversations with council for the city, we were told that they must move quickly because the eminent domain process takes a long time.

Respectfully, that's simply not accurate.

There is no statutory deadline to build a waste transfer station.

In fact, it is our understanding that the city already sought pre-approval from the DEC for the project.

The city's prior outreach to the DC clearly demonstrates that the acquisition has been the city's intent for quite some time and is independent from the common council's decision to pass this resolution resolution.

The urgency to record to acquire the subject property is solely at the city's discretion and should not sway the common council to steamroll and pass this resolution.

With the landfill's anticipated closure, we understand that a transfer station is a necessity, but the Simon should not have to pay the price by being abruptly pushed out of their home.

We respectfully request that the council allow the Simons time to review the city's underlying documents and obtain independent appraisals.

It is vital to understand the logistics of an eminent domain proceeding and just how quickly the Simons could lose their home.

Under New York's imminent domain law, once a public hearing is held and a determination and findings report is issued, the city can promptly move to vest title and seek possession.

This whole process, claimed to be extensive, can happen in a matter of months, and the subject property, which was been consecutively owned for more than 70 years, could be legally taken.

Since the last regular meeting, just two weeks ago, the Simons have done everything the city deemed necessary, including retaining an appraiser.

The independent independent appraisal of the subject property will include the required highest and best use analysis and is estimated to be completed within three to five weeks.

Additionally, our office submitted foil requests to obtain any and all records concerning the city's planning, environmental review, and site selection process for the transfer station.

Those requests remain outstanding.

In light of this, it would be premature to move forward with a public hearing tonight to force this matter forward.

The Simons are not opposing the city's objectives.

They are only asking for fairness, time, and transparency.

They have been cooperative residents and community members for generations.

In the event the parties are unable to reach a settlement after the appraisal is obtained, and if the city still wishes to proceed at its breakneck speed to take the property, it will have lost virtually nothing by allowing a few additional weeks of fairness.

However, scheduling a public hearing tonight would force the Simons to negotiate without an appraisal, which is not fair, not considerate, and not in the best interest of the city.

In conclusion, we respectfully ask the council to extend the same consideration now and continue to table this resolution until the Simons appraisal is completed and meaningful discussions can take place.

We look forward to continuing to work with the city in good faith to reach a solution that is fair to all parties.

Thank you for your attention and consideration to this important resolution.

Thank you.

Can the clerk call next speaker?

Kimberly McCoy.

Kimberly McCoy.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Thank you for the opportunity to be here tonight.

As I sit and listen, I recall that it was 10 years ago that I retired from this body.

I can't believe it's been that long, but I find myself and really in an enviable position because at the county level, we are also undertaking a review of the county budget and listening to you tonight.

And I commend you for the work that you're doing.

And there's no way that we can say thank you enough for all that you do.

But I came here tonight because I wanted, for one, um, to talk about the Citizens Police Review Board as one of the original sponsors of the Citizen Police Review Board legislation back in 2000.

I am compelled to come here and say something about the condition in which we find ourselves with the CPRB.

The original intent was to protect the citizens and the police department.

To find our to watch and see that three members of the board resigned at once is heartbreaking.

Um to know that of what the citizens, as well as there was at least three council members that worked on this legislation along with a large body of individuals from the community.

And to see it in the state where we're at now, it really is troubling to me.

So I would just ask that you stay at the table, continue to have conversation, to continue to try to find the right people to sit at the table so that nobody's left behind.

Continue to have conversation such that people don't feel like it's a weak body or a body that has no teeth, as we've been talking about for over 20 years.

When you decided to incorporate subpoena power a few years ago, I thought we were moving in the right direction.

But please do not abandon the ship.

This is a project.

This is a concept that we need here in the city of Albany.

It has been working.

What changed?

I don't know.

We have to do a better job, I think, of recruiting the kind of people who understand what the purpose of a CPRB is and how it can help to move the city forward.

If we're going to address these other issues that are confronting our city, if you're going to make people believe that this is a safe city and that you have the opportunity to recruit officers that want to be a part of the Albany police department because they believe that is a job that they can feel proud to undertake in Albany.

We've got to have greater conversation.

Someone talked about this is one of those difficult conversations.

Well, you gotta have it.

So as someone who sat here for many months and worked on this legislation and actually received an award from the Metro Land back in 2000 when this was established.

So I ask that you would just please continue to work on that.

Another thing I want to come down here and talk about the um the speed tickets.

I get a ticket a week.

I don't know about anybody else's experience, but I've had to change my route to get home.

One minute remaining.

And I'm not the only one I know that is experiencing this.

When I was um making phone calls over the last several months, people seniors, and I'm a senior myself, I'm proud to say, have told me they have to change where they're going to the pharmacy, they have to change how they go and do their um shopping, because this is a problem.

All I'm asking you to do is give me a review of what other than tell me that you got four million dollars, tell me something else that can make people feel comfortable that this is working, other than just get $50, $35 going to a vendor, $15 going to a city, you got a five-year contract where you can't change it.

This is what I've been told.

That just that's it's troublesome to me, and I ask that you just continue to review the process.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Madam President.

Can a clerk call next speaker?

Andrea Williamson, um good evening, everyone.

Um, I want to say I suck in the notion of my councilman Johnson as far as the taxes being.

Can you just state your name in the Oh, Andrea Wilkinson, Albany?

Um I suck in the notion of the property taxes increase, increased.

And last year I had like a 50%.

My taxes have doubled.

I just wrote out a check yesterday, Saturday, trying to meet the deadlines for school taxes, and unfortunately, I couldn't pay them all.

I had to pick and choose which properties I would pay taxes on.

I am on the South End.

I'm a businessman on the South End.

I own about 10 pieces of properties over there.

I pay about probably 50 grand a year over the 20 something years that I've been on the South End.

I have concerns about the drug infestation, the prostitution, the homelessness, and the dirtiness that exists with on the South End.

And it's like from the foot of the bridge all the way over to Morton, further down.

And I want to say, what about us?

What about the children that are on the South End?

What about the single mothers with their children?

And what about the small businesses that are on South Pearl?

I have to pay $300 to get someone to clean up the back of my building the other day.

Condom, feces, urine, needles.

On top of me writing out a check on Saturday for about $20,000.

I can't afford it.

My tenants can't afford it.

That when you all increase upon me, I have to pass it on to them.

Or if I we don't get the services that we should be seen, I have to come out of my pocket and pay more, and therefore pass it on.

I am trying to be, I am a good landlord, and I'm fair.

I don't increase my tenants unless there's a need to do so.

But with the taxes that are taking place, with the increases of the taxes in the city of Albany and the lack of services on the South End.

It's a travesty.

It's sad.

It's so blazing.

You get off the Clinton Avenue, and it's like you're in Manhattan somewhere.

And then you get off at Madison, the roads are raggedy, garbage is everywhere.

And I just I'm asking, please share the wealth equally throughout the city.

You have to take care of Arbor Hill.

You have to take care of the South End.

It can't just be you take care of the areas that you want to take care of.

And I'll end on that.

And I'm at the point where I'm putting you all on notice, and I know y'all it's the unified court services or unified court.

But I am sick of the abuse, the hostility, the hostility, the aggressiveness that is being displayed, and I am being subjected to from Judge Kelly.

I have asked him to recuse himself on my cases because when he was corporate counsel, I sued Albany PD for wrongfully arresting me on my own property down on South Pearl.

We went all the way to Utica.

Y'all had to settle, and y'all had to pay me.

And he needs to not preside over any of my cases.

Pointed his finger at me, yell and scream at me, and demanded me to answer him, and my attorney was objecting, saying she doesn't have to answer you.

The level of hostility, the level, it's abusive to me now.

I'm asking y'all to please look into taking care of better care of the South and clean it up with the drugs and the infestation.

And I'm asking you all to look at the tone of your judges that you have in your city court when it comes to landlord tenant.

We have the right to be respected.

We have the right to not be mistreated, and I feel like I'm being harassed, discriminated against, and his behavior is progressively getting aggressive.

And I don't like it as a woman.

I'm a woman of color.

I find him to be quite intimidating.

And I've asked Carol McLaughlin to speak with him, and she has, and I've asked my councilman to speak with him.

And I do believe he has also.

So I'm asking y'all to checkmate the tone that's in your city court when it comes to LT, and especially me with Judge Kelly.

Thank you, ma'am.

Time's up.

Can a clerk recall next speaker?

Gary Price.

Good evening.

Um my name is Gary Price.

Thank you for your time.

I'm a Albany resident uh without a district because I'm currently without shelter.

I am otherwise known as homeless.

I am a member of the National Union of the Homeless, which is national organization that has a local chapter here in Albany.

And there are several of my comrades otherwise who also brought union members with me today.

So we're just here to let people know that we're exist and that we're here in Albany, and we're trying to address the problem of homelessness, which is not going to get better.

It's going to get worse before it gets better.

So I hope that the next mayoral administration will have a point person on the subject of homelessness, and we would be very interested and happy and open to have communications with the mayor's office on this subject.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

James Gio Cologne.

Good evening.

My name is James Chuckalone, and I'm a resident of the second ward.

We all know that Albany is currently experiencing an affordable housing crisis.

The response to an affordable housing crisis is not to eliminate protections that ensure a small fraction of new housing is affordable to the majority of residents.

It's particularly absurd to be taking such an action.

One week after the county of Albany passed county local law G designating the development of affordable housing as a governmental and public purpose of the county, and less than two weeks after the election of a replacement for the mayor who repeatedly vetoed these exact affordable housing requirements.

Let's not fool ourselves about how this amendment is going to work.

Landlords are going to elect to have no affordable housing in their buildings because why would they choose to limit how much they can charge people?

And then they're going to charge their tenants more to make up for the $10,000 that they had to pay the city in order to get that exemption from the affordability requirement.

And in case that doesn't make a clear connection for you, this means the amendment will help people who can almost afford to buy a home because that's where the money is going, is to those down payments, with money taken from people who aren't even close to being able to afford to buy a home because they're still renting.

If you're gonna give up on the affordable housing requirement, as it's currently written, you will hurt renters less by striking it completely than by taking on this amendment.

Uh because either way, no developer who doesn't want to build affordable housing is going to.

And under this amendment, money will also be siphoned from renters to new home buyers and the financial groups that are giving them mortgages.

New housing that isn't affordable drives up the cost of all housing.

So just building more housing on its own doesn't help.

The competition only drives down prices if the new prices are lower than the ones that it are currently on the market.

And there's no incentive to do that when not participating in the market means freezing to death, as we all would soon be doing over the next couple of months.

Regulation is the only thing that can fix an unaffordable housing market.

Let's not cut down the regulations that we have.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Can a clerk next speaker?

Joseph Paperone, good evening, everyone.

My name is Reverend Joe Paperon.

Uh, I'm an organizer and member of the National Union of the Homeless, the Nonviolent Medicaid Army, and the New York State Poor People's Campaign.

And I just before I get into what I was thinking I was gonna say, I have to comment.

It's really interesting, I think, for our outgoing mayor to take credit for raising the wages of the lowest paid workers in the city.

Correct me if I got my history wrong, but wasn't that a really drawn-out contract fight that those blue-collar workers had with this mayoral administration?

I just I need to put that out there because I think part of my role uh in in the different spaces I organize is building power for the people.

And that's what we've been doing in our chapter, the National Union of the Homeless, for the last year, just over a year.

We started meeting in July of last year.

Uh there were four people at our first meeting.

Now we've got uh over a dozen consistent members, another whole wider circle of people who are participating regularly regularly in our actions, and what we've done is build power for the poorest and most marginalized in our city.

Uh we've been organizing, we had a number of our leaders advocate at the state level for the housing access voucher program, which was at least uh partially successful this year.

Uh we met with some of the mayoral candidates during the primary earlier this year, and we've conducted public outreach, talking to our neighbors, holding cookouts down by the river.

Uh ultimately, I think one of the biggest things we're doing is challenging narratives about poverty and homelessness.

We live in a society that is propagandized with anti-poor attitudes.

We are taught from birth to hate the poor.

It is the worst thing you could be in your life is poor.

If you're poor, you must have screwed up.

You did something wrong.

And we are challenging that.

We are saying there's a system that is making people poor.

We're told, even by well-meaning people, what is communicated is that poor and especially homeless folks are incapable of doing anything, let alone organizing for power.

We're either treated as charity cases, objects to be pitied, and maybe tossed a few bones, or criminalized, objects of fear.

And the folks in our union uh call nonsense on both of those narratives.

Um by coming together, by learning together, by studying, by organizing together.

We challenge those narratives, and I gotta say, these are the toughest people I've ever met in my life.

Some of our members slept outside every night last winter.

I dare you to consider doing the same.

Right.

And they are fighting not only for themselves, not only in their self-interest, but they are fighting for just and decent housing for everyone.

This crisis is getting worse.

I heard a few folks mentioned that earlier.

Uh the federal government and cuts to HUD, what we just saw was a taste of what's coming with these snap cuts.

The snap cuts are actually going forward through work requirements.

And we know that the city can't do everything.

Last week, a number of our members spoke at the county legislature, and we'll be back there as well as here.

What we're calling on you all to do, knowing that you can't do everything, is prioritize, prioritize, prioritize, ending homelessness and poverty.

There are a lot of opportunities coming the way of the city of Albany.

Whether it's the CAP funding, uh, whether it's these things I've been seeing lately about reconnecting the plaza, and while I know this is more on the county side of things, the the St.

Rose campus, which has empty dorm buildings, people are sleeping outside tonight, and we'll be going forward while there are map there's room for everybody.

This should be a moral outrage.

We should be screaming from the rooftops to fix this.

Y'all have done really good things around tenant protections and inclusionary zoning, and I urge you to stay the course as best you can.

We need fighters.

If there are things that the city cannot do, it's okay.

Say that and then tell us what are you going to do to fight for the things that you need.

We will we will be with you.

If you want to march on the state capital and demand that the state do something, we're there.

We're already there.

That's what we've been fighting for and organizing for.

We need visionary leadership.

Um I I'm so glad y'all deal with this budget stuff.

I it is not my thing.

I'm a pastor.

I'm obviously uh moral reframing is my thing.

So thank you for all the hard work you put into this budget and assessing and analyzing and figuring out the nuts and bolts.

But I want to be really clear about some hard facts that there are our neighbors and my friends who are sleeping outside, and it ain't right, and it doesn't need to be this way, and we can fix this together.

Uh expand inclusionary zoning.

The the goal should be a hundred percent inclusionary zoning, right?

Nobody lacking housing due to their ability to pay.

If we got all these vacant buildings, how about a vacancy tax, right?

Uh that that would be a real targeted tax on people who are not contributing in the ways that we need them to in our city right now.

Uh lastly, I want to just extend an invitation.

Kelly and Jack met with us last year.

They came to our breakfast.

Thank you.

I want to extend that invitation to you all.

Please feel free to reach out to us.

Come talk with us.

Let's work on this stuff together.

We're struggling and striving to solve these problems.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Can a clerk call next speaker?

Krista Edroy.

Good evening.

My name is Krista.

Uh, I reside at 98 Columbia Street, uh, member of Board 3.

And I'm here to talk about inclusion air zoning.

Um can we expect tenants in the city of Albany to afford luxuriously priced apartments, which are a result of no regulation when a majority of the tenants in the city are paying more than 30% of their income on rent.

The average monthly income of a UTA assisted tenant household was $1,683, and the household size was of two people.

The fair market rent for a two-bedroom apartment in the city of Albany is now going for $1,207, meaning those tenants have $476 left over for food, necessities, utilities, transportation, etc.

A majority of Albany tenants cannot afford fair market rent, and fair market rents rise significantly in comparison to wages, which scarcely rise.

The Albany Housing Authority weight list is years, years, years long.

There are not enough Section 8 vouchers and the HUD funding that UTA had, which was supposed to temporarily subsidize low-income tenants within the city was cut off by the Trump administrations, and tenants have nowhere to turn.

The idea that housing developers will consider the needs of the community they're building in is simply untrue.

If developers instinctively felt to do that, we would have affordable housing built everywhere already, but we do not.

An inclusionary zoning would not be a need, but it is.

Time and time again, we see luxury complexes being built where there is no regulation because developers will take advantage for profits and high returns.

It is the job of the city to protect tenants from price gouging developers.

And since we have no choice when it comes to working with developers that care about profit more than they care about the community, the only way of doing that while also meeting the needs of the tenants is through regulation.

Aside from taking a financial burden off of tenants, inclusionary zoning brings more people to businesses within the community, which in turn aids the city's economy.

When rent isn't affordable, it leads to eviction, homelessness, and more funding being spent on shelters and temporary housing over stable long-term housing.

It allows families to thrive by not facing the enormous hardship that comes with homelessness or staying in shelters.

It allows members of all communities to have access to a better education, gives families more job opportunities and stabilizes communities and homes.

So I urge you not to overturn inclusionary zoning.

Thank you.

Richard Johnson.

Good evening.

My name is Richard Johnson.

When Joe was speaking about homeless people, he was speaking about me.

I was behind the state legislative building for months because IVH wanted 90% of my income.

But they didn't give me 90% of anything.

I had to fight for everything.

I've been fighting all my life.

When am I gonna be able to stop fighting?

Not until the last homeless person is put in the casket.

Well, I give up, man.

I can't do it.

It's against everything I'd love.

First off, I'm a brooklyn, and people from Brooklyn don't give up.

I was brought up with a mother.

My father died when I was 12 years old.

The street became my father.

And common sense told after three state bids, after three state bids, I'd finally put the guns and the and the drugs down.

But I can't get no, I can't get no resolution to this.

It's crazy that me and you have the same last name.

I'm a Johnson Emmer Johnson.

The only thing is the color of the skin, man.

Come on, man.

These people are outside fighting for their lives.

And we're in here arguing about a budget.

Come on, man.

It's gotta be better than this.

I've been fighting all my life.

I'm 57 years old now.

God broke my leg in the parking garage.

They told me I would never walk again.

Well, I got up with this beautiful leg that the guy gave me.

With the beautiful leg that the guy gave me, and he's dead now, and I'm still alive.

So I gotta keep moving.

I can't stop, won't stop.

I gotta get it, get it.

The same way as if I was out there getting it in the street the same way I gotta get it in here.

I gotta fight for people that don't want to fight for themselves.

It's crazy, but it's true.

Why are we fighting against each other, right?

To get housing.

No, man.

It shouldn't be this hard, man.

It should be different, man.

You know what I'm saying?

When I grew up as a kid, I used to like Albany, man.

But then when I came up here from Brooklyn, New York, Albany was like wide open.

You didn't have to worry about going on people's property and getting thrown off.

In Brooklyn, it Bensonhurst, they had, they had gated communities where people couldn't go in.

If you went in on that block, your ass was out of there.

They would they would beat you off the block.

In Albany, you could just lay back and relax and enjoy the city, right?

But you can't enjoy the city if you're in the cold.

Because I don't like the cold.

I don't like the cold, man.

I'd rather have the heat than the cold.

But here's what we gotta do, man.

We gotta come up with a simple solution.

Because Craig Apple just took it upon himself to move up into the St.

Rose College campus.

We didn't have a say in that.

Well, Dan McCoy should have jumped on him and told him he couldn't do that.

But instead, homeless people are still in the street, man.

And then the people, the merchants on Lark Street, they complain because the homeless population is keeping the consumers away from the stores.

I had a man telling me that I couldn't do my laundry in the laundry, Matt, because I was homeless.

I said, I'll call Trump Donald Trump on you, bro.

That's what I'll do.

I'll call Trump.

Trump is stronger than you are.

You may go tell me I can't do my laundry in here.

I'll call the cop, call whoever you want, man.

Call whoever you want.

But homeless, the homeless population needs help, man.

They said that homeless people are drug addicts.

No, man.

No, not all of them.

Some of them are.

I'll agree with that, but not all of them.

The buck's gotta stop here, man.

You shouldn't be paying, we shouldn't be paying for people families.

We shouldn't be paying families for inmates getting beat up in Albany County jail.

That's what Craig Apple should be worried about.

Paying those families instead of taking my money after I retired to pay for those families.

No, man, I'm not accepting that.

That's the same thing I told him at the comic at the other meeting, the legislature, state legislative meeting.

I'm not expecting.

One minute remain.

I'm not accepting that, man.

I'm with Pete Flight and eventually we're gonna get a revenue.

Thank you.

Can the clerk call next speaker?

Maria Markovic.

Hi.

I'm Maria Markovich, and I still live at 38 Myrtle Avenue.

So I'm here on behalf of housing for all.

And we're strongly opposed to repealing the existing inclusionary housing ordinance.

There's been a lot of misconceptions going around, and you know, this ordinance has been blamed for everything from like cracked sidewalks to the demise of the central warehouse.

So I think it's time we start to look at stuff.

And we agree with Alfredo that we need to have a real discussion, which has not happened.

The ordinance is viewed as some kind of radical piece of housing, you know, because it it says that 7% of units goes from 7% with buildings with 20 or more up to uh 13% for buildings with 76 or more.

And that's viewed as very, very radical.

Well, actually, nationally, in the 300 inclusionary housing programs, 16% affordable housing set aside is the norm.

Secondly, uh the mayor has said that the 2023 uh ordinance lowered the income threshold for affordable units, making it even harder for developers uh to do housing.

So the 2017 ordinance was set at 100% of the Albany median income, which is about 48,000.

The 2023 ordinance is set at 60 percent of the area median income, which is 48,500.

They're the same.

So I I think in the ordinance you're proposing, it calls for a hundred percent of the area median income, which would be crazy, because that would be 117,800.

So that's not the audience you're trying to address.

So there is no difference in income between the 2017 and the 2023.

So the mayor has also said that there's been no more development since the ordinance was passed.

Um, and she sent out, I think two letters to that effect.

She said pre-2023, there was an average of 300 units a year.

Um, and then 23 on, it's gone.

She one said 250 units, another said 200 units a year.

I mean, really, I it seems unclear how many units have come on the market.

Um, I mean, you know, she dismisses high interest rates, but I don't think you can dismiss that.

And the other thing is that, you know, the big box, there's been a saturation of 2,500 a month, big box apartment complexes.

And you know, um, you know, that could be why they're not jumping to do a lot more.

But obviously, though, aside from that, the demand has not stopped.

So, you know, inclusionary zoning is an important tool, and it probably the only tool for creating economically integrated housing.

It isn't like high rise here and low income housing here.

In an inclusionary unit building of a hundred, thirteen of those units will be for moderate income people.

They will be for the people who are making the 48,500, the people who work for the city of Albany who are, you know, are you know, nursing assistants, the people, school attendance, and certainly um throwing out inclusionary zoning and putting in place an opt-out for developers where they can pay $5,000 or $10,000 into a fund is really a cop out.

Because you know full well, those developers are getting far more in taxpayer subsidies that extend for some time than the five or ten thousand dollars per unit uh that this fund would create.

So we agree there needs to be a discussion, and you know, housing for all is open for discussion.

Um but it's so far what's happened is more of an attack than a discussion.

Thank you, Ms.

Marley.

Okay.

Time's up.

Thank you so much for the first time.

I was writing just getting ready to my closing line, but those are the same.

Sorry, thank you.

Can it be called the next speaker?

Kanye Ryan.

Uh good evening again.

Um I also commend you all for how much time this meeting is taking and the many meetings that you all sit through.

Um my name's Kenyan Ryan.

I'm the executive director of United Tenants of Albany.

I live at 25 North Pine Av.

Umgrats as well to those who were re-elected, and farewell to those who have retired from the common council for now.

Um I'm also here to talk about inclusionary zoning.

Uh, and like Maria, I feel like this has not been a conversation.

Um parties have definitely spoken, but they haven't spoken to each other, and this council has been very open and willing to have conversations with the administration, uh, but they've not been responded to with times to meet.

And suddenly there's this big rush to repeal inclusionary zoning, and to me, it's like, well, what is the rush?

Well, the rush is likely the capitalized Albany Albany's potential funding, this 250 plus million dollars coming down the pike to stir local and ideally social development, and the developers are salvating at the opportunity for this free money, in addition to the pilots and other subsidies that Maria talked about, um, that this cap uh will hold to further fatten their pockets.

And inclusionary zoning is indeed a limitation on how much profit that they're gonna make, because it means that low-income tenants will benefit from lower rents.

And this grants those tenants the same luxuries afforded to those who can afford dignified, safe, and new housing.

Market rate housing is absolutely unattainable to the majority of tenants in our city.

I cannot afford it, and I am an executive director.

I'm not the most well-paid executive director, but I can't afford new housing.

Um that's not just me, it's the majority of our tenants.

And the truth is that this housing is not intended for the people who live in the city of Albany.

And I mean that because we keep talking about growing our population, and it's these prospective yuppies that will hopefully multiply our population at the expense of those who live here now, and those who are being left out of this conversation now as well.

Those who stand to benefit from all the new development we are anticipating, and who will finally be able to escape, or sorry, those who have been excluded from this conversation are those who would benefit from uh who do benefit from this policy and would finally be able to escape the substandard housing that myself and other tenants that I work with face every day if this CAP funding is materialized with inclusionary zoning standing, because all this new development will benefit tenants who live here now.

Um but you know, they're getting all this, the developers are getting all this money, free money from the state, and then we're fighting to, you know, the ideal of this repeal is so that they also won't have to provide affordable housing for the tenants who live here now.

And this proposal is not just a step back to where we started either.

It's actually two steps back, because when the 2023 inclusionary zoning law was passed, we went from, as Maria said, 100% of the city of median income to 60% of the area median income, which is a different metric and was comparable, as Maria said, to the 2019 version.

But the language change in this repeal or amendment changes that 60% of AMI to 100% the area median income, which is actually a lot different than the 100% city median income.

Um basically what that means is if landlords don't pay to escape inclusionary zoning, then the inclusionary zoning that they do provide is actually for people who have a much higher income than who would benefit from inclusionary zoning now or who benefited from it in 2019.

So now we're talking about tenants who make $80,000 being the 100% area median income who would benefit from this new inclusionary zoning as proposed in this repeal, assuming that landlords it's just it's kooky, and it's actually a really big difference because if a landlord can charge the going rent for a tenant who has an area median income of 100%, then they actually don't need to opt out of the inclusionary zoning because the rent is going to be the same as any other tenant.

Because it's not for low income tenants anymore, it's for tenants who have 100% the area median income, which is Albany Schenectady and rental or county income, very different than the city of Albany.

So they actually don't even have to pay to exempt themselves because the rent will be the same as it would be for fair market rent tenants, which is just that's a really big difference.

So it actually does not address the inclusionary zoning question at all if it if a landlord pays.

I hope that that's really clear.

I'm I know I'm kind of like all over the place, but it's a huge difference.

Um the last part here is that with this payout, if a landlord, uh if a developer says, Oh, I don't want to have to provide uh affordable housing to people with a 100% the area median income and they pay the city of Albany, that money will go to a bunch of homeownership programs, which is a completely different demographic than those who would benefit from inclusionary zoning now.

So now we're talking about homeowners and homeownership grants rather than programs for tenants like the affordable housing that's provided through inclusionary zoning.

So this repeal doesn't actually address the issue at all, and the benefits of the of the repeal don't benefit tenants either.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Can a clerk and I'll call the next speaker?

Tandra LeGrone Good evening.

I'm here, uh Tandra LeGrone, uh CEO of Inner Own Voices.

Um I want to first thank the council for bringing up the resolution for TDOR Trans Day of Remembrance.

Um I think uh Richard Conti will be doing that resolution a little bit later.

Is that true?

Soon.

Soon.

Um the things I want to highlight is where we are as it impacts our LGBTQ plus individuals, including myself.

We are at a time uh currently that we are living under an administration that is actively seeking to not only erase my existence, but the existence of my community and the community that I belong to.

I am very fortunate to be an Albanian, which I love, but there are a lot of individuals, including within the capital region, that are that do not have that convenience of being an Albanian and being supported by the city of Albany.

For years, the city of Albany has uh provided a safe haven for LGBTQI plus individuals.

So what this resolution means at a time right now in 2025, it means that not only are LGBTQI plus, but transgendered and gender nonconforming and nine-binary individuals are being seen, being heard, and given the message that they matter, and this is important.

The other the other part that I want to bring up that I brought up last year was that we also have to acknowledge that there is still a safety issue, a huge safety issue uh for our trans and gender nonconforming and non-binary individuals.

We cannot be remiss not to name a Sid Hemenwei Powell, who was brutally murdered.

I would be remiss not to mention Dominique Ely, who was murdered as well.

These were cruel acts of violence, just targeted for who they were as individuals and human beings.

So what this resolution means not only for the residents of the city of Albany is sends a message across not only the capital region but throughout the country to say we see you, you matter, and we're going to fight for you.

We're going to fight for you in this current administration, and we're going to continue to fight for you ongoing.

So I want to thank you all for putting this resolution forward because it means so much to so many people.

And I'm going to end there.

I would be remiss if I sat here as a CEO of an organization that is in the trend that is in the midst of building a new LGBT center right here in the city of Albany that will also include rapid and transitional housing.

As you know, on last Thursday, the COC, the HUD, NOFO came out.

And I will sit here and tell you in next year of 2026, 20 September or October towards the end, we are going to see a shift in the amount of people that will be left out and without housing.

This is a crisis.

And we can't we have to continue to have this conversation.

So please continue to keep that on your agenda.

I appreciate each and every one of you for all of your support, and thank you for having me.

Thank you.

That is a final speaker that signed up tonight for public comment period.

You have your hand up.

I hope that you put me on the list when I thought about it.

Oh, you wanted to be on the public comment?

Yeah, I did.

Okay, well, come come come.

I can call it.

If I speak on public hearing, can I speak later?

And I and it's yes, she could.

I thought she had already was on the to get on.

Oh, you called her?

Oh, she mustn't hear your name.

Oh, she said no?

Oh, you did call her seat?

It's been a very long night for everybody.

That's right.

So thank you again for letting me speak.

Um I want to speak about ordinance 2510125 to amend 375, Chapter 375 of the USDO, to change the zoning classification of 540 Morris Street.

The request is to change a two-unit, which is an R2, to a multi-unit, and it's listed as MUR-M, and then to amend the zoning map accordingly.

So just for the record, the city tax rolls list 540 as a one-unit dwelling.

So how can you vote on it as a two-unit dwelling to make it a more multi-unit dwelling?

I looked at the um the street and looked at the housing on it, and most of these properties are owned by LLCs, and I'm just wondering are people coming in and taking advantage of Albany housing for their cash cows?

And then why do we need to change zoning?

This is like a spot zoning change.

Why do we need to bring it before the common council to have this zoning changed?

Um I want to, you know, like piggyback into this.

Well, first of all, you shouldn't do that until you get it straightened out.

This is a one-family that is being represented as a two-family, which wants to morph into a multifamily, and then just change the whole tax map.

So I want to bring also up ordinance 2610125 to amend Chapter 231 of housing by adding new part seven, requiring disclosure of beneficial owners of LLC companies and other entities that hold residential property in the city of Albany.

And I really appreciate that.

Mr.

Ballorin is presenting that.

And I was really dismayed to see all of these houses owned by people that don't live in our city, don't even live in our state, and the rest are LLCs.

Who are these people?

Just I'm going to ask you to get that straightened out before we do anything, because this is a mess.

Thank you.

And we'll move on to approval of minutes from previous meeting, Mr.

Kimborough.

Approval of minutes from previous meeting.

Yes, thank you, sir.

Mr.

President, I offer the November 3rd of 2025 meeting minutes for approval.

Second.

All those in favor?

Aye.

Aye.

Those opposed.

Approval of minutes passes.

Mr.

Kimbrough, you wanted to take uh certain ordinances and resolutions out of order.

Yeah, what was that number, Richard?

You you wanted to take a look at the question.

131, 112, 25.

Yep.

I voted.

Ordinance 27.

Resolution 127.

Oh, oh, you want me to do all of those?

Yeah, okay.

Yeah.

Resolution 123, you stated 125, 132, and 131.

Yes.

Motion to take those out of order.

271.

Is there a motion?

Yes.

Is there a second?

All those in favor?

Aye.

Those opposed.

Any discussion?

Motion passes.

So we'll start with ordinance 20.

So resolution.

Mr.

Conti's resolution.

Oh, you want to do Mr.

Conte's?

Okay.

Can the clerk, Mr.

Conti?

Okay.

May I start?

Okay.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I offer resolution 131.112.25R.

Uh, and ask it's for its passage and uh vote thereon.

Thank you.

Can the clerk please read the resolution?

Resolution of the common council recognizing Transgender Day of Remembrance and honoring the lives laws to anti-violent anti-uh transgender violence.

Thank you.

Discussion on this resolution, Mr.

Conte.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I want to thank uh Ms.

Luke Ms.

Luke Tandra LeGrone.

We all know Tandra for uh addressing us earlier uh inner own voices as one of the premier organizations really providing services to the trans community here in the capital region, and I really can't say it better than her.

Um this this resolution uh speaks to a community uh that is in many ways uh under siege by what's going on on the federal level in so many different different ways uh being targeted.

Um I I spoke to this issue in March when we passed the Transgender Day of Remembrance Resolution.

It's the same here.

Um in the past we've routinely passed this resolution and others, but uh it's more important now than ever, as I've said before, uh, that is more symbolic.

It is a strong statement from this council.

Uh it's an affirmation of our support for our for a part of our community here in the city of Albany, uh, of our support and of our welcoming.

Uh so what we did in March, and even our uh the local law amendment to the city charter that we adopted last week or at our last meeting, similarly sent a message as that we are a welcoming city uh for all.

Um so again, I want to uh thank Tandra.

Um I want to just reiterate that this is more than a symbolic vote.

It is a very public affirmation of our support uh for the trans community uh and for the broader LGBTQ community, which is also part of my community, uh and uh the importance of our passage and continuing to be uh a voice in support of those communities that uh experience and suffer oppression.

Uh so I would appreciate your support for this tonight, and uh I do have a copy if we pass that I would like to present.

Thank you.

Any further discussion?

Seeing everyone is a co-sponsor, this will be a voice vote voice vote.

All those in favor?

Uh resolution passes.

Well that's moving right along.

We're going to uh ordinances, we're going to ordinance held.

Uh and the ordinance twenty.

Well, we're taking them out of order.

They want them out of order.

So Ms.

Frederick.

No problem.

I just do what I'm told.

We're starting with 27, correct?

Twenty-seven, correct?

Thank you.

Okay, I move to amend ordinance twenty-seven one oh one twenty-five in the form circulated to members and made available uh to the public this evening, including the following changes.

First, an increase to common council office equipment and the amount of one thousand five hundred, an increase to common council contracted services for the commission on disability services of one thousand, increase to the city clerk for furniture and fixtures of three thousand, a decrease to street lighting uh utilities of one hundred thousand, decrease to public works, DGS hourly one hundred thousand, decrease to public works, DGS motor vehicle repairs fifty thousand, decrease to elections, city sheriff county elections expense forty thousand, decrease to office equipment, admin services twenty-eight thousand, decrease to common council training and conferences two thousand five hundred for a total general fund expenditure amendment decrease of three thousand fifteen.

Um in addition three thousand eighteen.

One second.

Okay.

So we have the calculator.

Um one second, we have a total amount expenditure um variance here.

I just want to make sure we have the right figures.

Can we I can we respectfully move to local laws as we sort through this?

Can you hold off on this?

Okay.

So we'll go to we'll go to the next.

What do you think you have it done in thirty seconds?

We do.

Oh yeah.

Thank you, Council members.

Will we Fredericks would like to continue?

Thank you for the moment of recess there.

I want to make sure our city clerk gets their front desk replacement.

That is well overdue.

Yes.

Okay.

Council now is back in session.

Okay, thank you, Mr.

President.

I move to amend ordinance 2710125 in the form circulated to the members and made available to the public, including uh the following changes that you see listed in the general fund expenditure amendment table, summing up to a total of 315,000 with a general fund revenue offset reduction to the real property tax levy of point five percent and equivalent of 350,000.

With these offsets, the net impact of above changes to the budget is zero dollars.

Discussion on these amendments.

Uh but in many ways it's a document to chart the near term, you know, particularly when it comes to the future of our city.

Especially as our city will be will swear in a new mayor for the first time in more than a decade.

We need to make sure that the new mayor has the tools to succeed so that Albany succeeds.

And that means making sure that we pass a budget.

That is not over.

Okay, go ahead.

Yeah.

I'm gonna give you it's just about the amendments.

It's not the past the budget.

Gotcha, gotcha.

I know this is not the budget.

I was more so speaking about the reduction.

Okay, so you okay.

I just want to make sure you talk about the overall budget.

We're talking about the no, no, not the whole budget.

That's another speech.

Okay.

Yeah, that's that's 10 that's a 10 minute speech.

But anyway, um I want to hear something about these amendments.

I'll keep it brief, just two more two more sentences, all right.

But so but I um I support these decreases.

Um it's not just fiscally responsible, but also provides income in May with the flexibility needed to respond to uncertain challenges as our city may face in the future.

Sorry to my colleagues to support this.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any more discussion on the amendments.

Uh Mr.

Howie.

Uh thank you, Mr.

President.

Um yeah, one of the things I brought up, and I I it's not here, and I wish it was, but I'm sitting here tonight watching Councilman Adams having a borrow a microphone so he could speak.

And I mean I it it bugs me that we can't have decent equipment in our chambers.

I look up at my light over here with two broken alabasters.

Yes, but it's it's part of the picture.

Well, I mean, you can have that discussion when the budget when the budget comes up.

This is about the amendments to the budget.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you, Mr.

Howie.

Since there is no more discussion on these particular amendments, all those in favor.

Aye.

Those opposed amendments passed.

Thank you.

Sorry.

Ms.

Fredericks.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I notice ordinance 2710125 as amended this evening for passage by roll call vote.

Thank you.

Can the clerk please read the ordinance?

An ordinance adopting the City of Albany budget for fiscal year 2026 as presented by the mayor on October 1st, 2025, and as amended by the common council therein.

Thank you.

Ms.

Fredericks and then Mr.

Howie.

I want you to have at it.

Oh, you don't want to go ahead, Ms.

Fredericks.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

It's been a long night.

So thank you, everyone.

All right.

Tonight we're voting on a budget that reflects careful work, analysis, and collaboration.

As finance chair, I'm proud of the approach that we took this season, rooted in responsibility and transparency.

We began this budget season with known challenges, rising costs, inflationary pressures, a year in both in which both property taxes and curbside collection fee were set to increase.

We also heard the concerns from our constituencies who already feel the weight of rising costs in every part of their lives.

That's why we, as the common council made affordability our central focus for this year's budget.

Through our review and targeted amendments, we are able to reduce the property tax levy by five percent, easing some of the burden on our residents at a time when it matters most.

While this reduction may sound small on paper for some families, that balance rising cost of housing, food and utilities cost, every bit of relief counts.

In good faith, we work with the administration to come up with a compromise here.

We have heard one of the number one issues of our residents is affordability.

Some can say that this decrease is not worth the squeeze, but if you are on a fixed income, truly every dollar counts, and that is what we focused on as a body.

While this budget is not perfect, no budget ever is, but it's one that balances fiscal sustainability with the lived reality of our residents.

For these reasons, I'll be voting in favor of this budget, and I encourage my colleagues to do the same.

Thank you.

Mr.

Anani.

You don't want to give your budget speech.

Okay.

Ms.

Ms.

Ms.

Keegan.

No, I just want to thank Sonia for um the Chair of Finance Committee.

Sorry.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

No, I just want to really thank uh the chair of the finance committee and the finance committee members for all their hard work over the past couple of months.

And uh again, this is not a budget that um you know is not a great budget, but again, like I say, don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

This budget is a step in the right direction, and I look forward to supporting urge my colleagues to do the same.

Thank you.

Ms.

Keegan.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I want to lift up Councilmember Anani's words in praise of councilmember Frederick and all of the work that she has done on behalf of the city during the last four years, leading us through very very difficult budget sessions.

Um has been selfless in this process.

She's put in a lot of hard work and dedication, um, and she is just such a wonderful asset to us.

I'm I'm sad to see you go, but I am so thankful for the work that you've done and the work that you did to get this budget over the hump.

Um oftentimes are a little spicy, and she definitely has tolerated all of our varying personalities and managed to get us to compromise on some really difficult issues.

Um, and so thank you.

Um you should be proud of this legislation and of this bill and of getting us to this point, especially given our really short time frame this year.

Ms.

Zamer.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Um, I just want to briefly thank the finance committee members who I attended uh the the meetings I could attend at the others I watched uh virtually if I couldn't be here in person and um I felt you asked all the questions that I needed to have answered.

You were thorough, um, you worked so hard um behind the scenes, and to chairwoman Frederick.

Um you led us through this process with skill and grace, and you'll be deeply missed uh by this body in our next term.

Thank you all.

Thank you, Ms.

Farrell, and then Mr.

Holy.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Um I wanted to thank my colleagues on the finance committee.

Um, council members Adams, Malloran, Keegan, and of course, our chair, Councilmember Frederick, for the many, many hours of meetings.

It is not easy to be on the finance committee.

And it is, but it's also one of the most important functions that we can do as a council member.

The process, the budget process is the opportunity for us to really go through each part, each department, and ask the questions that need to be asked.

We are the sunlight on the budget.

And um, and we're fortunate that we've been able to partner with the administration because not every administration allows so much sunlight, and I I feel comfortable that we'll be able to continue to have that much sunlight with the new administration as well.

Um, and I huge thanks to Councilmember Frederick.

It has been an absolute honor to serve with you, and I um we will definitely miss you here, especially during budget.

But you can like send us selfies while you're doing something fabulous else.

Um, but your intelligence, your hard work, um, the way that you calmly go through every facet diligently.

We just we so appreciate you.

So thank you so much for all that you've given every budget process.

But um this one was more difficult than some have been in the past, and um you've still shown up with grace and diligence and hard work, and you're just so appreciated.

So thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Holy, and then Mr.

Bower.

Thank you.

Um I want to say thank you to the committee and to you, Jenny.

I know you didn't thank yourself, so I had to give you a thank you, but especially Sonia.

I mean, you did a great job.

Um it was so much fun.

I came to most every meeting because it was better than watching TV.

But seriously, it it's great to see how the city works, to hear where we're gonna spend the money, have the department heads come in and thank you for uh shepherding us to this point, and uh we really appreciate it.

Thank you.

Baller.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I'm gonna echo the statements that have already been said by my colleagues.

Many thanks to all the committee members, all the members who are not on the committee but still attended regularly, and to all the members that have asked questions, put in uh request and put in information.

Uh thank you for that.

Thank you to also Gideon, uh budget director, uh, for his many, many nights here with us and the many gray hairs that I'm sure we've given him to the process.

Uh any administration for their work with us and uh trying to find a compromise.

Of course, I really do have to give my greatest thanks to our outgoing chair uh Sonia Frederick uh for the many, many years of service that she's given to our city to the many, many hours that she's given uh to this process throughout those years, the difficult phone calls, the difficult uh someone said spicy, and I think we are a little spicy, uh, but uh personalities that she's balanced and uh different perspectives and different views that she's been able to honestly take in and and do the best you could to get people uh closer to where they were looking to be.

Um and that balance uh will be fully fully missed.

Uh that dedication and that willingness to go behind the scenes and have those tough conversations uh that nobody else sees uh has always been appreciated, and just want to let you know we I wish you the best in all your future uh uh adventures, and again, I also look forward to seeing many, many, many successful days ahead for you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any further discussion?

Oh, Mr.

Conte.

Uh thank you, Mr.

President.

Um, and I want to add my accolades to uh council member uh Frederick and the the finance committee for the work they did.

Um it's important.

I I know one of the frustrations we often have uh finance members and other members of the council is sometimes the limitations we have in terms of what we can do with the budget.

And uh one of the tasks I think for for the next council is to really seriously take a look at that uh to see what our authority is and where uh where we can uh make some revisions so we have uh and we can play an important role.

That being said, the process that we have is valuable.

Um the meetings that we have with department heads is important.

We didn't always have that when I first came on board many many years ago.

Uh but you know, I always tell new members, especially if you want to understand how city government works and what departments do, pay attention to the budget, and come to the budget meetings and listen to the departmental presentations, and that's where you learn how the government works, what the various departments uh do, and when you need something, where you go and how you what what are the pressure points?

Uh so those those hearings uh and those interactions, they were important interactions with department hence are important uh because we learn, the public learns, um, and departments also understand and learn what constituent concerns are, which we translate into as well.

Uh but again I want to uh express my appreciation, you know, coming back here after hiatus uh for the work that council member Frederick did.

Um there is life after this council.

Uh so uh best wishes uh for your your service on this body uh and uh thank you for what you did uh with this budget as well.

Thank you, Mr.

Johnson.

I'm gonna keep this brief.

I just want to say thank you because the chair that you uh replaced, your comments were a lot quicker and faster than uh Julie.

You know, I appreciated Judy.

But um you you did the job in less words, and and a lot of times that was appreciated.

Um so I just want to say thank you.

Unfortunately, I will not be supporting it, but you know it has nothing to do with you or the effort of the committee.

Um I feel strongly about um when I did used to come and listen to the department has and uh and and the um the connection that I have with the cities.

A lot of times I can hear when they just talking.

And um, I just want to say thank you for your um service and thank you um to the uh finance committee um members.

Thank you.

Any further discussion?

Well, I'd like to just say um thank you to the finance committee and thank you to our finance chair uh who has uh bright future in front of her.

Thank you for your service uh to the finance committee.

Thank you for your service to the city of Albany.

Uh this is the final budget that she will oversee.

Uh and this budget um hit hard, but it was necessary.

Um and we've dealt with this council dealt with uh budgets in the past, hard budgets, and made hard tough decisions, and uh, I will hope that every council member does support this budget.

Um your finance chair and your council members, they worked hard uh to try to come up with a compromise, and I believe that's what uh being in office is about.

It's about compromising sometimes.

Uh and the city administration have shown throughout the 12 years that they recognize keeping spending down, keeping taxes down, and also have recognized when council members uh wanted things in their communities such as parks and those improvements, and so we cannot overlook that.

So this one year where you know the percentage was a little bit higher than most.

Uh, we can't overlook that we got here, not just because of uh today, uh, but of what COVID did to us.

Uh COVID, as I said earlier, COVID didn't allow us to really try to uh phase in this uh this uh trash tax.

Uh we had to do it at this moment.

Um I believe it puts us on uh the future for the next mayor um budget that will help them uh shape the city and their vision and help them uh accomplish those things that they need to accomplish.

And I think it would also with the addition of the jobs that are added, it's going to show a more uh communicative um uh uh administrative because and we said this at the budget hearing meeting when your uh when your chief of staff is handling communications and handling community, it's handling things get lost and and and and it's a tough job when one person is doing the job of three, and we have to move forward as a city.

Uh and that is moving forward as a city with these with the new uh jobs uh that are put in the administrative uh mayor's office.

It's moving the city forward.

Uh changes tough, changes hard, but changes needed.

And so uh we must keep those things in mind.

Uh and uh I I am so honored to when I saw every budget hearing and and saw council members trying to put money in and figure out um not just this year but other years as well.

Um that's how government is supposed to work.

I sat on the council for four years.

It did not work like that.

It did not.

Uh there was a gentleman years ago called uh democracy in Albany, and he started this online uh conversation about democracy in Albany.

And at the time he was writing that, he didn't believe there was democracy in Albany.

I sit here today in 2025 in the last eight years, and even before I came back to the council, four years prior to me coming back.

Uh does there need to be some changes?

Absolutely, absolutely.

Does it need probably some charter changes?

Absolutely, but you guys will work through that.

You'll work with your next mayor and you'll figure it out.

Democracy is in Albany, because democracy in Albany didn't veto or override mayor's beatles in the past, the democracy in Albany did not question the mayor's budget in fear of retaliation.

You guys can question the mayor's budget, and that door was still open, and there was no retaliation for it, because that's democracy, and so uh with this budget.

I hope uh council members will support it, and uh and those who are going to be here for the next budget, democracy is in Albany, and it's in your hands as count as leg as city councilman as legislators.

So with that being said, can the clerk please call the roll?

Adams, yes, Anani, yes, Ballorin, yes, Clark, yes, Comte, yes, Farrell, yes, Flynn, yes, Frederick, yes, Hoey, yes, Johnson, no, Keegan, yes, Kimbrough, yes, Love, yes, Robinson, yes, Zamer, yes, 14, yes, one no.

Ordinance passes.

Moving on to uh resolutions taken out of order.

Uh 123.

Let me get my um who is that sorry?

I'm out of order myself now.

Um Councilman Frederick.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I notice resolution 123-10125 and experts passes by passage by roll call vote.

Thank you.

Can the clerk please read the resolution?

A resolution of the common council establishing the locally adjusted base proportions of the homestead and non-homestead classes for property tax purposes pursuant to Article 19 of the real property tax law.

Discussion on this resolution.

Seeing none, can the clerk please call the roll?

Yes, sorry.

Anani.

Yes, Ballerin.

Yes, Clerk, yes, Conti?

Yes, Farrell?

Yes, Flynn?

Yes.

Frederick.

Yes.

Howie?

Yes.

Johnson?

Yes.

Keegan.

Yes.

Kimbrough?

Yes.

Love.

Yes.

Robinson?

Yes.

Zamer.

Yes.

15.

Yes.

Resolution passed.

Continue on.

Uh resolution 132.

Councilman Frederick.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I move to amend resolution 132-112-25R in the form circulated to members and made available to the public this evening, including the following changes on page two under property tax levy levy and revenue streams subsection.

We have changed the prop property tax levy amount to 2.5%, noting out 0.5% reduction.

On page three, under safety in our communities, fifth paragraph, we have added a new paragraph in relations to insurance funds recouped from damaged police vehicles, urging the new administration to look to give those recouped funds back to the Albany Police Department as opposed to general insurance recovery so that they can use those funds to purchase new police vehicles and ultimately decrease the amount of debt that we authorized for those purchases.

Everything else stays consistent from what we have passed the following Thursday in finance committee.

Discussion on those amendment.

All those in favor, all those opposed.

Motion on amendments passed.

So Miss Uh Frederick.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I notice resolution 132-1125R as amended this evening and asked for its passage by roll call vote.

Thank you.

Can the clerk please read the resolution?

A resolution of the Common Council outlining its actions and expressing its findings and intent concerning the city of Albany's 2026 budget and pro as proposed in ordinance 27-10125.

Discussion on this resolution.

Seeing none, can the clerk please call the roll?

Adams.

Yes, brother.

Use your base.

Just use your base.

I got a I got on my acknowledgement.

Okay.

Dramatic effect.

Mr.

Adams.

Yes.

Thank you.

Anani.

Yes.

Ballarin.

Yes.

Clark.

Yes.

Conzi?

Yes.

Farrow.

Yes.

Lynn?

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Hoey.

Yes.

Johnson.

Yes.

Keegan.

Yes.

Co-sponsor, please.

Kimbrough.

Yes.

Love.

Yes.

Robinson.

Yes.

Yes.

Zamer.

Yes.

15 in the affirmative.

Resolution passes.

Now we'll move back to our normal agenda.

Considerations of local laws.

Going to local laws and reduce.

Ms.

Ms.

Zamer.

Oh, no, local law D, sorry.

Why is that?

Why does that say MC?

Ms.

No, D.

Curbside Voice.

Curbside voice question.

Okay.

Zamer.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I notice local law F of 2025 as amended and ask for its introduction.

Thank you.

Can the clerk please read the local law?

A local all amending part 41, commissions on monuments and public art of Chapter 42, departments and commission of the code of the city of Albany in relation to the scope of the Commission's responsibility and authority.

Thank you, Mr.

Kimbrough.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

It's a referral to the Council's Law Committee.

Thank you.

Continuing on with local laws.

Local laws held.

Ms.

Frederick.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I move to amend local law C of 2025 to add appropriate lines for the President Pro Tem and Pro Temp and the Majority Leader.

Because this is a local law, it will need to age and will not be voted on this evening.

Thank you.

Any discussion on this amendment?

All right.

All those in those opposed to this amendment.

See none.

Amendment passes.

Thank you.

Move it on, continuing on with local laws.

Ms.

Fredericks.

Thank you.

I notice local law D of 2025, an ax for its passage by roll call vote.

Thank you.

Can the clerk please read the local law?

A local all amending the curbside waste collection fee.

Discussion on this local law.

Seeing none.

Can the clerk please call the roll?

Oh, Mr.

Conti, sorry.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Way back in 2016, I was charged, you might say, with uh shepherding the original local law through this council was not a pleasant task.

Uh back then there was some thought uh as it was structured back then that we would review the uh the the uh the collection fee annually and and adjust it based on the costs um and that became controversial and you know at some point we just hit the flat fee and then moved forward, which we're now doubling it for whatever reasons.

But that aside, my my concern with uh this this fee, and I and I will vote.

I'm voting for it, uh, but uh I really think we need to uh re-examine uh the whole topic of how we deal with trash and the incentives and the uh the budget intent memo has some discussion on that, but we are not as city government, we are not you know it we we shouldn't be put putting ourselves uh in comparing ourselves to private haulers who don't care about waste reduction but simply charge a fee uh to to take the trash away and dump it wherever they dump it.

As city government, we have a responsibility in some way uh to provide incentives uh to reduce the amount of waste that is produced uh and that um that our citizens now pay for uh to take take away.

Um my biggest complaint about this this is a one-size fit fits all fee, which is unfair uh because not all of us generate the same amount of trash as others do, whether it's based on family size, whether it's based on more attentiveness to say reduce reuse uh you know uh recycle.

Um we need to move to a system, and especially as we're going the landfill closes, and we're moving to a system where it's gonna be much more costly to dispose of our waste.

We need we need to move to a system which provides incentives to reduce the amount of waste uh that's generated and disposed of uh and how it's disposed of.

We need to look at issues like packaging.

We need to support state legislation that reduces packaging, but we really need to begin to look at incentives.

Um I've talked about you know uh curbside uh pickup of composting, incentives for people who actually do composting now, and they they pay to take have it taken away in addition to the trash fee they pay.

There's so many things that we should be looking at to really reduce the amount of trash uh and waste that we uh would that we produce.

In my household, we produce very little.

We compost.

We I you know I I put out trash once every other week uh based on different recycling and composting and things of that nature.

But we need to do we need to provide incentives.

Uh and so that's why I'm urging the council, the future councils to really seriously look at that issue uh beyond having just having a flat fee that is a one-size fits all that doesn't provide any incentive for waste reduction.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

McConnell.

See no further discussion.

Can the clerk please call the roll?

Adams.

Yes.

Anani?

No.

Ballorin?

Yes.

Clark?

Yes.

Conzi?

Yes.

Barrell?

Yes.

Lynn?

No.

Frederick?

Yes.

Howie?

Yes.

Johnson?

No.

Keegan?

Yes.

Kimbrough?

Yes.

Love?

Yes.

Robinson?

Yes.

Zamer.

Yes.

12, any affirmative?

Three, no.

Law passes.

Continuing on.

Um reports of any standing committees.

Mr.

Holy.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

The uh public safety committee uh met today at noon.

I appreciate the committee members uh for coming at lunchtime and spending their lunch hour interviewing three prospective uh applicants for the uh community police review board.

All three were excellent.

Um it was a hard decision uh to make because we only have two openings, and by the way, the mayor has three openings that and some of them are two years old, but we'll leave it at that.

So we're hoping that with this we'll be able to have a quorum after the next meeting if the council go ahead and vote for the two people that we recommend.

We are going to have another meeting.

I think tentatively, we're talking about December 10th, to have the police chief come in and um talk a little bit more about the incident that happened on November 4th.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Frederick.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

The finance committee met on Monday, November 10th to discuss the mayor's office presentation, corporation council, as well as local loss of 2025, in addition to overall budget uh amendments and changes uh that were discussed this evening.

We also continued that discussion into Thursday uh November 13th, where we uh drafted the budget intent memo and the ordinance that was just voted on.

Uh in the future, we will be noticing a meeting within the month of December to discuss, have an overall discussion on our debt.

Um, and at that time we will uh hopefully council members can join us, post that discussion.

We will look to post uh uh vote on the bond ordinances uh prior to the end of this calendar year.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Flynn, and then Mr.

Johnson.

Uh the General Services Committee met November 5th to discuss resolution 9791 25R and 1192 25R, and both came out with favorable recommendations.

Thank you.

Johnson.

Thank you, Ms.

Mr.

President.

Um today the housing and committee community development committee met and we discussed the budget set it uh set aside for housing uh related activities, and we're trying to come up with a plan to make sure that that money goes to assist uh people who are helping some of our um families that are struggling with their rent and um the city court.

Um we will meet again to uh finalize the uh plans that we're gonna go forward with.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Further.

Um now we'll hear from uh Mr.

McGee.

Good evening, everyone.

Um I know it's late, but I did want to take a moment to talk about resolution 121 101 25R concerning the eminent domain of Rap Road.

So I'm hoping we'll be removed from having been tabled at this uh later this evening.

I wanted specifically, and I we addressed a lot of this at caucus last week, so I'll keep it very brief, but I wanted to address some of the comments brought up by Ms.

Kokosco from Lumerie Chrysler.

So this negotiation has been going on for a very long time.

I think the most recent phase began in April of 24 when they around it was around that time they entered into a right of first refusal with the city with respect to these properties.

Um in that time we've been attempting to negotiate with them for the purchase of the wrap road parcels.

We need those parcels uh as part of our closing down of the landfill.

Um the only way we can do that economically or feasibly is by building a transfer station on those particular parcels.

Um we've had those properties appraised.

The appraisal has come in.

Um the appraisal did in fact include a highest best value analysis, contrary to what we you were told tonight.

We offered the owners of the property um more than you know the offer would have been roughly twice the value of those properties.

They have ceased negotiating, they had ceased negotiating with us at that point.

Um that brought us to kind of the the it brought us to the uh a point where we needed to pursue eminent domain.

As soon as we started to take that seriously, they started to take us seriously, and negotiations started to move forward, but they're only going to continue to take those negotiations seriously to the extent that we take eminent domain seriously.

So I hope tonight that you will pass this resolution.

Um the resolution itself is not to you know uh uh seize the properties tonight.

The resolution tonight is to schedule a hearing that will happen on December 15th.

At that hearing, a presentation is gonna be made, similar to the presentation we made last Wednesday, going over all of the reasons why we need this property in order to close the landfill.

If after that presentation you don't feel like the city has made a uh a proper showing, you can you can make a decision not to move forward with eminent domain, but now we need at this point we need to move that process forward.

We need to keep the keep the keep the momentum going because we need to um acquire site control as quickly as possible.

Ms.

Kokosco uh said that we are pursuing things with the DEC, that we have an application going.

That process is stalled until we have site control.

We can do no we can't do anything further with that until there's a clear path by which we can acquire title to these properties.

And then you know, finally, one of the things that Ms.

Kokosso indicated was that the these op these properties were being operated, we're being used as a home, but these are the home of the of the folks who owned it.

The bulk of the properties are owned by a trust.

They do not live there full-time.

They even they claimed only to occupy the properties a few months of a month of uh only a few months out of the year.

This is ultimately in a negotiation about the price of these properties.

Um we're looking forward to receiving an appraisal from them.

Uh, you know, which after a year and a half, we probably should have received by now.

But at the end of the day, we need the council's backing so that we can keep these negotiations going forward.

We can make sure that we hit that there is a plan B in the form of eminent domain, and as that process is going forward, we're gonna continue negotiating in good faith.

And you know, we look forward to your support as we do that.

Thank you.

Does any council members have any questions for this?

Mr.

McGee.

Mr.

Holley.

Yeah, uh Mr.

McGee, can you mention what you had mentioned in our executive session about the limitations if it's an executive session?

Executive session is private.

Oh.

Well, I can I can go ahead.

I think I can answer in a way um that wouldn't require executive session.

But yeah, under the constitution, the city is bad is is prohibited from making a gift to a private party.

Um, and that's why we simply can't pay what the the property owners are asking this at this point, which is five times the assessed value of the property.

You know, we have an obligation to get you know, we have an obligation to the taxpayers to get a fair price for these these parcels, which is why we need your support.

That's my question was about the height restrictions of what can be built on that property.

Oh, precisely, yeah, and that and that goes into the highest best use.

I mean, the highest best use is gonna factor in what you can legally do on the property.

Um these properties are zoned residential, they're you know surrounded by nature preserve.

You simply cannot do the sort of high commercial development that um that would justify the the the sort of price that they're asking for.

Thank you.

Mr.

Bower.

Thank you.

Um so I think for me the biggest question is you know, are these residents using it as their home?

You know, and I know a lot of people, you know, especially as you get older, they may fly to Florida during the winter and come back during the summer.

So do we have any proof that this is not their primary?

Yeah, are they using the star exemption?

You know, do we have anything that says that this is not their primary home?

I can represent to you what's been represented to us, which is that it's not being occupied as our primary residence.

I don't believe it received it could receive a star exemption because it's owned by a trust, it's owned by it's not owned by an individual.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I think the most important part, this didn't happen in last six months.

This has been over a year and some change.

So with that being said, uh where were we?

Okay.

Considerations of ordinances.

Moving on to ordinances held.

Mr.

Kimbrough.

Okay.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I notice uh ordinance 2661 uh 23 uh as amended and I ask for its passage.

Thank you.

Is there any discussion on the amendment of this ordinance?

Is there any just for the record for the uh amendment?

It was circulated uh by our staff.

I want to say November 7th, but it it said the amendment simply incorporated revised uh goal schedule and dual certification language is is all okay the amendment was.

Is there any opposition to that amendment?

See none passes.

Mr.

Kimbrough.

Thank you.

Uh so uh thank you, Mr.

President.

I notice ordinance 2661 23 and ask for its passage.

Thank you.

Can the clerk please read the ordinance?

In ordinance amending chapter 48 equal opportunity protections of the code of the city of Albany in relation to expanding the scope of minority minority and women-owned and controlled businesses.

Discussion on this ordinance.

Seeing none, can the clerk please call the role?

You want okay.

The clerk please call the roll.

Adams.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Anani?

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Ballorin.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Clark.

Yes.

Conte?

Yes.

Farrell.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Lynn?

Yes, co-sponsor.

Frederick.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Howie.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Johnson?

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Keegan.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Kimbrough.

Yes.

Love.

Yes, co-sponsor.

Robinson.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Zamer.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

15 in the affirmative.

Ordinance passes.

I guess this will be Mr.

Conti.

You do this for Ms.

Romero?

No, I think it's I don't know.

Who's going to do it?

Mr.

Ballarin, Mr.

Conti, which one?

I would say Mr.

Conte should do it.

All right.

Mr.

Conti.

First, I believe there's an amendment we need to amend it.

I don't have an amendment here.

Doesn't say any of my notes this amendment.

Just a is this amended?

It needs to be but it doesn't say.

Yeah, because it did so I would move to adopt the amendments.

The amendments are actually incorporate in the consideration.

The the the uh parking district, etc.

All right.

Conte has made a motion to amend 2062.24.

Is there any objections to this amendment?

See none.

Motion passes.

Mr.

Conti.

Thank you.

Uh Mr.

President, I notice uh ordinance 2062-24, originally sponsored by Councilmember Romero.

Uh ask its passage and a roll call vote thereon.

Thank you.

Can the clerk please read the ordinance?

An ordinance amending section 357-74, establishments of the of a residential parking permit system of chapter 359 vehicles and traffic of the code of the city of Albany in relation to a modifying the boundaries of the residential parking permit system.

Discussion on this, Mr.

Conte.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

So uh this implements uh the additional residential parking permit uh slots that we actually got back in 2021.

Uh it's been a long process to uh be able to uh identify the locations and divvying up those spots 750.

So this uh allocates 750 additional uh permit parking spots.

Uh it also expands the uh the boundary of the allowable uh permit zone from I believe it was three quarters of a mile radius from the Empire State Plaza to a mile and a quarter, I believe.

Uh so those were the two of the key provisions that were included in the state legislation that was adopted back in 2021.

Uh and this will benefit I know Park South, uh Washington Square, uh I believe Sheridan Hollow uh and uh some spots on uh Morris as well.

Uh so long waited uh expansion uh and it takes effect February 15th, so it it coordinates with when the existing permit uh system the uh renewals and new applications come up so it will phase right into the existing system.

Um I know it representing the Park South area.

We've been waiting a long time to get something uh done in that area, and this this addresses in my area, uh Park South, some important areas.

So uh I want to thank Mr.

Ballorin for coordinating this, and uh I also want to thank uh Bill Trudeau from the engineering department who's not here, he's off on vacation, I believe, uh, who is always intergal integral in issues like this uh when it comes to uh streets and roads and trying to figure out traffic and things of that nature.

So uh uh he's an important part of this process as well, and want to make sure he's acknowledged.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Ballorin, then Mr.

Johnson.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I uh I want to thank everyone who worked on this.

This is a very long process for those who don't remember.

Uh we started this back in like 2019 to get it passed at the state level uh to get the the additional spots and the additional expansion.

So I want to thank our state state representatives who helped us back then and and uh I want all the staff who who helped get this.

It took a little bit, uh, but I uh appreciate the conversations we had.

Um you know, when we looked at the 750 additional spots, we we really uh divvy them up uh with a lot of grace and respect for each other.

So I really appreciate everyone that was part of the process.

Uh of course um uh Mr.

Bill Tudeau uh and his team, uh our team who helped put together the legislation, and of course, Mr.

Conti, who came back uh and gave us uh uh history uh and and a lot of uh guidance to this process.

So uh this is one I'm very excited to vote for uh very long awaited and I'm glad it's here it's going to affect my residents directly, uh and I'm glad we we get to pass this today.

Thank you.

Mr.

Johnson?

Yes, I just wanted to say um thank you to Mr.

Ballorin, because I remember when we first um started on this, they shut you down a couple of times and left you hanging, but you know um your perseverance and um as well as uh councilwoman um Romero um got this over, and and that's really what the this work is about is when you know something is is uh good and you keep uh fighting for it.

So uh go fight.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Seeing no further discussion, can the clerk please call the roll?

Adams.

Yes.

Anani.

Yes, Ballorin, yes, co-sponsor, please.

Clark.

Yes.

Consi?

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Farrow, yes.

Flynn, yes.

Frederick, yes, how we sponsor, please.

Johnson?

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Keegan.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Kimbrough?

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Love.

Yes, co-sponsor.

Robinson.

Yes, co-sponsor, please.

Zamer, yes.

15 in the affirmative.

Ordinance passes.

Continued on with ordinances.

Mr.

Clark.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

I make a motion to amend ordinance 25.101.25 to the version labeled 25.101.25 proposed amended November 17, 2025, and to refer such ordinance to Albany County Planning Board for review at its December meeting.

A copy of which has been provided to membership.

Is there is there any objections to that?

Yes.

Did he say the incorrect number?

24 24.

24, 10.

Any objections to this amendment?

Mr.

President.

Discussion, Mr.

Hope.

Uh yes.

I I make a motion that we table this because this is very unusual how this was brought up.

It was not brought up in committee.

And actually, uh I uh temporarily feel that we should uh table this so we have a chance to discuss it and understand exactly what's going on.

Thank you.

Oh, do I have a second for the motion?

Mr.

Ballard and Secret.

All those in favor?

Aye.

Aye.

Those opposed?

No.

Nay.

Nay.

Take a boys vote.

We'll take a roll call on the uh the the roll call vote is to table the amendment of ordinance 24101 to point twenty-five.

That is what the vote is on right now.

Whether to table this ordinance.

Can the clerk please read table the amendment?

Sorry, not the ordinance.

Thank you.

To table the amendment.

Can the clerk please call the roll?

Adams?

No.

Anani.

Ballorin?

Yes.

Clerk?

No.

Conte?

No.

Farrow.

Yes.

Flynn?

No.

Frederick?

No.

Howie.

Yes.

Johnson?

Yes.

Keegan?

No.

Kimbrough?

Yes.

Love.

No.

Robinson?

No.

Zamer?

No.

Six no six yes, nine no.

Six yes.

So amate moves forward.

Now we will have a uh all those in the motion to table.

The motion and table.

Six yes and nine no.

The motion fails.

The motion fails to table.

The motion fails to table.

Now we will move on to the vote to amend the ordinance.

All those in favor.

Can we have a comment?

Can we speak on the discussion on the amendment?

Mr.

Ballard.