Finance Committee Budget Hearing - May 4, 2026
Finance Committee Budget Hearing - May 4, 2026
This special meeting of the Annapolis Finance Committee, held on May 4, 2026, from 9:34 a.m. to 12:21 p.m., focused on budget presentations for the Office of Community Services (OCS) and the Department of Transportation (DOT) for Fiscal Year 2027. The committee reviewed performance metrics, discussed program priorities, and requested follow-up data on several items.
Consent Calendar
- Approved the special meeting agenda and the minutes from the April 29, 2026 special meeting (FC 4.29.26) by voice vote.
Discussion Items
- Office of Community Services (OCS) – Community Grants Program: Director Aisha Young and Aaron Lee presented accomplishments including rebranding, site visits, grant trainings, and a new health enrollment assistance program. Key performance measures: 19 site visits in FY26 (goal: all 35 grantees in FY27), 47 of 69 grantees submitted quarterly reports, rental assistance program open seven months in FY26 (goal: nine months in FY27), 92 of 161 rental applications approved. A request for a case management software (Capstone, $9,600) was discussed. The committee prioritized housing, homelessness, food security, and utility assistance over general programming for the 35 recommended grant awards (out of 62 applicants, total request $1.7M, funding pool $373,700). Alderman Thorp requested adding an "FY26 Adopted Community Grants" column to the spreadsheet. Alderwoman O'Neill raised concerns about repeat rental assistance clients and proposed partnerships with financial literacy programs. Questions about specific grant allocations (e.g., Assistant League of the Chesapeake, Blacks of the Chesapeake, Eastport Volunteer Fire Department) were addressed.
- Department of Transportation (DOT): Director Marcus Moore and Deputy Director Agyemang-Duah presented on transit and parking performance. Noted: 0 FTA-reportable accidents per 100,000 vehicle revenue miles; 100% adherence to preventive maintenance; on-street parking revenue outpacing FY25; collection rate of fines at 76% (previously reported). The committee discussed the electric shuttle pilot in Eastport (ended, assets redeployed to City Dock), and Alderman Thorp expressed interest in reinstating the service in Ward 8. Alderman Huntley requested a cost estimate for additional variable messaging signage and the current percentage for collection rate of fines. The deputy director confirmed that the city has signed a grant agreement for a hybrid ferry, but the mayor has not made a final decision to proceed. Discussion also covered marketing needs, ADA service, and the possibility of a third electric shuttle for Eastport.
Key Outcomes
- Follow-ups requested:
- OCS to add an FY26 Adopted Community Grants column to the Grant Funding spreadsheet.
- DOT to provide data tracking for the electric shuttle in Eastport, a cost estimate for more variable messaging signage, and the current collection rate of fines (previously 76%).
- DOT to explore the feasibility and cost of a third electric shuttle for Eastport (potential March 2027 start).
- Decisions: No formal votes on budget items; the committee will consider amendments at a future meeting. Alderman Thorp indicated potential changes to the community grants code.
- Next steps: Committee members will receive updated spreadsheets and follow-up data before further budget deliberations.
Meeting Transcript
34 a.m. on May 4th, 2026. Good morning, everybody. Uh at this time I'll take a roll call, Autobin Thorpe. You here? Switching it up today, put you first. Auto Roman O'Neill, you're here. Okay, I'm present also. Um, is there a motion to approve the agenda as written? Send them. Second. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is there a motion to approve the minutes as they from the last meeting as presented? Moved. Second. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. All right. Thanks so much for pairing with us as we got started with things. Folks, the floor is yours. Thank you. Um, Aisha Young, Director, Office of Community Services. Thank you for introduction. Sure. And hi, good morning, everyone. I'm Aaron Lee, Social Work Care Coordinator with the Office of Community Services. We'll go through our budget presentation. This year is a little over than three, but I feel like we accomplished so much. And just to give a little background, I've been here for two years, so I feel like I'm just still learning a little bit, but excited about all the things that we've done so far. So we focused a lot on rebranding because when I first started, or when I got here, um, we didn't have a distinguished um identity, I should say. A lot of people confused us with community action agency, or they didn't know exactly who we were or what our work entailed so I focused on, or I feel like we should have focused on the rebranding, and that's something that we did. We did a lot of new um materials working with uh Mitchell, helping us come up with new uh logos and icons, and just having a uniform branding. I don't know if you all seen the wellness man before, but the wrapping on the wellness man, just trying to, I don't want to say that the artwork wasn't great, but a lot of people thought it was like daycare, even though the pictures on there were um adults, but it still kind of looks like daycare. So just focusing on moving away from that so that we could really establish um the Office of Community Services. And as you all know, we house the grants or manage the grants. One thing that we didn't do were like site visits, some grant trainings, um, quarterly progress sessions. So we focused on some of that, um, hosting trainings around grant writing, sustainability, fundraising, AI training, those were um received very well. Site visits, visiting each uh grantee or whomever signs up. It wasn't mandatory, but we um asked everyone if they were interested for us to uh come to just sign up and we come out just to observe their work, see how we could better support them, and also put faces to names because I haven't seen a lot of people in person, just talk to them through email, and then the quarterly progress sessions was something that I came up with. I'm kind of calling it a progress party to just celebrate the work that the organizations are doing, also the success within the quarters, specifically first quarter and then fourth quarter, and then also engaging them in a way to submit their reports. It's like you can only kind of be celebrated for your success and what the organization is doing if you submit your reports and we can actually read to see you know your progress, and then we gave out some awards for that and just celebrated their success. Um, the health literacy and enrollment in medical building. This is something new. Our enrollment assistant Evie Hernandez, um, she became a certified navigator through Maryland Health Connection. We also became a they call it something different, but uh an organization that can certify people to become certified um navigators, and this way they can help people sign up for health care through healthcare.gov. So she can walk them through the whole process of how to sign up for care, understanding health insurance, you know what a deductible is, how to pick the best plan. Um, she's been working on that as well. So that's fairly new. She started last open enrollment, which was November 1st.
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