Welcome back to this biweekly meeting of the budget and policy committee of Denver City Council.

Join us for the discussion as the budget and policy committee starts now.

Thank you for joining us.

I think this is the last budget policy for 2025.

So nice work.

It's been a lot of work.

I'm Mandy Sandoval, Council President, and we have just one briefing in front of us.

So let's go around the room and start with introductions, and I'll start to my left.

Hi, good afternoon.

Diana Romero Campbell, Southeast Denver, District 4.

Good afternoon, Darren Watson, District 9.

Flora Alvitres, lucky to start seven.

Good afternoon.

Paul Cashman, South Denver, District 6.

Hi everyone.

Sadana Gonzalez Putina is one of your council members at large.

Amanda Sawyer, District Live.

Chantel is district.

Casey Gilmore District.

It's a weird echo.

And Sarah Parody, your other council member at large.

Thank you.

West Denver District 3.

Perfect.

We have a proposal for a two-year budget cycle and three council sponsors.

Councilwoman Sawyer, Gilmore, and Lewis, the floor is yours.

Awesome.

Thank you.

Okay, there's this really weird echo happening.

Hello.

Yeah, okay.

So I'm gonna back up a little bit.

Okay.

Okay, we are um here today.

Uh really appreciate my fellow council sponsors.

I'm sorry, this is freaking me out.

Yeah.

Um, to talk a little bit about uh the budget process and some potential um issue identification and some possible resolutions to those.

It's driving me crazy to those uh if you skip back further from the table, is it not?

I don't know, because I gotta do the slides.

No, it's okay.

Okay.

Um so we uh we have some thoughts for you today, and then we're here to hear your thoughts.

Um, this would be a charter change.

It would be uh, so it would we have plenty of time to continue this conversation before we uh before we come to a final um resolution on it.

So just gonna kind of go through with my fellow co-sponsors um some background, uh, what our Pier City research has looked like, uh, what our proposal for changes are, and then some conversation around the community feedback that we've already started um and timeline, and then we'll kind of get you guys' feedback on that.

So we have a clear thing before the audio on Thursday, so they they're figuring it out as we're talking.

I very much appreciate you guys, thank you.

Um, okay, so this is the timeline of what our current budget process looks like.

You guys all live this right now, so you really understand it.

Um, but the presentation we're giving for you today is a presentation we give to the public um last month, so uh the public is not as clear on our timeline, so I'll just kind of make sure that we go through everything so that everything we told the public is exactly what we're telling you as well.

Um, so January, February, March Q1 of the of the beginning of the year of any year that is when the Department of Finance closes out the budget from the previous year.

So in January, February, March 2026, they will be closing out the 2025 budget.

Which means starting April 1st, they uh then flip the switch and start looking at the 2026 budget, um, talking through with the departments on revenue projections, um, any budget proposals, those different kinds of things.

Right now, as you know, July 1st, we get a base budget from the Department of Finance that's written into the charter.

It um always changes in the September version and uh actually does nothing but provide false information to the community.

So one of the recommendations you'll see coming up is that we make a change to that because that base budget is is just not helpful for anyone.

Um September 15th, the mayor is required to provide us the budget, as you guys know.

Um that gives us five days to go through a thousand-page document um and uh to to ask questions before we start doing briefings and budget hearings.

Um, and then in October, the mayor submits his final budget.

Um, we then have the opportunity to um bring amendments.

Uh, the mayor can counsel and can uh accept or reject the council amendments, um, and then at the uh uh second week of November we have our budget vote as what happened this year.

The charter says the budget um is approved, whether council approves it or not, and then we do the long bill, what we refer to as the long bill, where all of the pieces of the budget are the dollars are actually appropriated to the agencies.

Um that's what the timeline looks like.

So just a little bit of a reminder, and I use the 2024 numbers because I think that it's uh easy to track, and that's a the year's closed.

Um, but we are talking about can you see my yeah, we're talking about the general fund, right?

Most people don't understand that the budget of the city and county of Denver is almost $5 billion, but the actual kind of um money that we talk about when we're talking about the budget is the general fund dollars.

So that is it was 1.5 billion in 2024.

Um just a reminder: we have fiscal policies.

Um, so our fiscal year is January through December.

We must have a balanced budget.

There is no definition of what a balanced budget is.

Um it has to include short-term and long-term planning.

So this is the annual budget as well as the five-year capital budget that looks at sort of today and then also looks into the future.

Uh, and then there are the required required contingency of two percent of general fund expenditures, the unassigned fund balance, which our fiscal rules recommend at 15%, and then there's a state right required tabor emergency reserve, which is 3% of all of the covered funds.

So if we look at the state constitution and the charter of the city of Denver, um we've got kind of those three guiding principles for how we manage our money to ensure that we're being fiscally responsible.

Um, again, contingency 2% of general fund expenditures, um, unassigned fund balance goal is 15%, and then we have the 3% state required tabor emergency reserve.

Um for contingency uses, uh, this is things like natural disasters, um, you know, unappropriated payouts from retirements and things like that, unexpected events.

I always describe it this way: if I make a hundred dollars in a year, I am gonna keep $15 in my bank account at all times.

And that $15 is gonna live there in case I get in a car accident or a pipe bursts or my kid has ever wisdom teeth removed or whatever, right?

Like an emergency situation that is not totally unrealistic but kind of unlikely to happen.

And so that is the same thing as our um as our unassigned fund balance.

That $15 just sort of sits there unspent uh in a normal year.

Um, and then for the um unassigned fund balance, which is sort of like our quote unquote savings count, we just talked a little bit more about this.

Um there are very clear fiscal rules on what that looks like.

So for funds that are above 15% one-time capital expenditures, there is a charter requirement that new appropriations from like dollars above that 15% go through city council and and be appropriated with city council from city council.

Um funds between 10 and 15% are really only for one-time expenditures to stabilize and during that period of time there also has to be specific reductions.

So we heard from the Department of Finance earlier this year, they knew we were gonna be below 15%, and so that was when maintain holding on to as much contingency as possible could be used.

That is when uh uh hiring freeze was put in place and furloughs were put in place.

So those were the three things in 2025 that the Department of Finance did to help preserve and keep us at that in between 12 and 15 percent.

That did not work.

Um, and so but uh so we reached 10%, we actually reached below 10%, um, and funds below 10% can really only be used in a severe economic crisis or a really truly unusual situation.

Uh and this is what triggered layoffs in 2025, right?

So um, so that is kind of just a background so that you all sort of understand and remember, because I know this stuff can get really complicated, um, what it looks like in terms of the rules that exist for uses of our unassigned fund balance and our contingency.

One other piece I will say about our contingency.

We talked about this last week, two weeks ago in committee, with regards to the uh late year supplemental appropriations that are coming to count, they're coming through council for different things, right?

So city council asked for I think it was $35,000 this year, and that $35,000 was because we had unanticipated payouts for aides who left city council.

Um you can't budget because you don't know if someone's gonna leave or someone's gonna stay, right?

And so those are the kinds of things that our contingency funds are used for on top of emergency situations, like if we have three feet of snow, right?

You can't budget for the fact that it did not snow until the middle of December this year.

You also can't budget for the fact that when it did snow, it snowed a foot or almost a foot, and we had to make sure we had all the plows out and all the you know, all the things to ensure the safety of our community.

But that's just not something you can budget for, and so that is what the contingency uses are for okay.

I think that's it for me.

That's right.

You're up next.

All right, thank you.

All right, let's let's take a look at what other jurisdictions um are doing, notably King County, Washington, and Fort Collins, Colorado.

There's kind of a lot here, so I won't read it all, but there's um here's what's similar and different between the two of these.

Um, starting with what's similar.

So both jurisdictions have a biannual budget process, but it's flexible, and so during the high uncertainty times, the budget timeline can be changed via ordinance to a single year as necessary.

That is annoying.

Yeah.

Um both budget cycles have a big or on-year and a smaller off-year.

And so in the on-year, the actual budget is passed.

In the off-year, the revenue and expenditure outlooks are revised and increased public testimony is offered on the public on the budget.

Um, some changes can be made, but they are typically minimal related to adjustments based on how revenue expenditures have changed.

Um, and then for what's different.

So in King County, the county executive proposes the two-year budget, but in Fort Collins, the budget is based on a strategic plan that is formed in part from a community input input process that occurs simultaneously.

You can go to the next slide.

Yes.

In addition to looking at the budget timeline, we also looked at other how other jurisdictions define balanced budget, as council member mentioned.

Again, there's kind of a lot of information here on this slide, and so I'm not gonna read it all to you, but I wanted to draw your attention to the following ways that the cities have attempted to account for what a balanced budget means.

And so in King County, it includes contingency contingency funds in the balanced budget and requires county council to pass appropriations use appropriations to use those funds at the request of the county exit at the county exec executive, and so it appears to apply whether expenditures exceed revenues or revenues exceed expenditures.

Whenever the executive wants to use the contingency, it must be approved by council.

Nashville requires unexpended fund balance and applicable reserves to be included in the city budget.

Aurora requires estimated cash balance surplus or deficit to be included from the current fiscal year and the time that the budget is passed.

And Atlanta requires the expenditures equal to revenues of the general funds, special revenue funds, and debt services.

Go to the next slide.

Changes to improve the process included the following.

Moving to a biannual budget.

So I mentioned the on year, so you pass the budget on the on year, this off year, you evaluate the accuracy of the budget projections versus reality or public process.

You'll hear us say on-year-off-year tweaks.

We haven't quite figured out what our language is, but we're getting close, y'all.

Um, also requiring a public process to get resident feedback.

And so you could use a strategic planning process like Fort Collins does, or other community engagement processes.

No one's gonna be surprised that I say civic assemblies here, because that's where I am in life.

Um, in addition to that, you can simplify the budget process timeline.

And so we talk about this a bit more in detail in a moment.

Um, to increase the transparency and financial reporting, and so you can use the small off year to be able to do the year to review, and then you define it.

We also define what makes a balanced budget, and so that can be inclusive of other pots of money that the city has lying around.

So you might think about bond interest, for example, and then change requirements around how unspent fund balance can be expended.

Now let's take a look at the changes in a bit more detail.

Thank you.

So the proposal is to allow Denver to use two-year budget cycles with the option to use a one-year cycle in times of economic uncertainty.

We mentioned this a couple a couple of times, and you have already seen there are a few ways to be able to do this to be able to do this.

The main thing is that you all that you have more time for everything, and so more time regarding planning, community engagement, agency work plans, and capital projects would all be greatly helped by having this additional time.

It also preserves flexibility, and so you can revert to shorter cycles in times of increased uncertainty.

And you can go to the next slide.

All right, I mentioned simplifying the process timeline before, which here means two things.

Remove the July 1st date, which requires a preliminary budget estimate, and then which is useless for us.

And then move the September 15th date a few weeks earlier to allow council members to be able to review before the budget hearings.

I think we had a week or a weekend.

I can't recall because it was so quickly this year.

The benefits are pretty much self-explanatory.

It gives the Department of Finance and agencies more time to actually plan the budget in July, and it gives us council more time to be able to review the budget and get communities engaged.

Okay, kick it over to council member again.

Thank you, Councilman Less.

Um really appreciate the partnership.

I think we've been talking about this close to a year, if not a little bit longer.

Um, and it's interesting how current events, recent events really show a strong reasoning for uh this direction, and so uh increasing transparency and uh financial reporting.

Uh I think folks have heard many times asked from this body, asking the Department of Finance to provide some sort of quarterly financial reporting, uh, something more for us to review, and then notifying city council, clerk and recorder, and auditor other electives of changes in the annual spending plans and any budget expansion opportunities.

Uh the benefits, it will keep us informed and the community informed so that they're not trying to follow headlines to understand what's going on in the city.

Uh, it will be a more coordinated uh information share.

It'll increase, of course, accountability and hopefully we'll cultivate trust in our city's financial management.

Uh defining a balanced budget, that's important, especially uh when we're talking about special revenue funds, um other uh pots of money throughout the city that we might not uh have an oversight or a report out on, and so defining balanced budget uh with your input would be very helpful, and then this ensures the projected expenditures won't outpace any revenues, the transparency, and then we know that contingency is really really important, and I hearken back to the pandemic when you know we had ARPA funds to help us out, but we also talked with our city employees and tried to make the best decisions based on how we could support them, and so we saw different techniques being deployed when there was a bit more information uh shared with folks.

Uh and then, you know, requiring public process to get resident feedback.

Uh this would require the administration to have a strategic plan in place to be informed with community input, and it's the basis of really developing that budget.

The benefits, uh residents will see their direct uh feedback and how that's deployed in those budget priorities, hopefully through different tools like surveys.

Uh, this would encourage the Department of Finance to really shore up how they're getting information from the community, and we all have town halls and different uh tabling opportunities that why don't we have the Department of Finance there sharing what the overall view of the city is that gets kind of distilled out to community through maybe the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure and Denver Parks and Rec through the six-year capital improvement projects.

But there's never a high-level tabling opportunity to for folks to really know where to go get more information about how city dollars are being spent, and then make sure that those priorities are grounded in the needs of the community.

And so as uh councilwoman Lewis uh mentioned, we had uh a community feedback session on November 5th, and the town hall.

Uh there were different ideas uh that were shared, but asking you know, the mayor's office outreach team to perhaps lead strategic visioning process, involve our advisory boards and commissions, uh, independent department of finance, uh, and then of course more time during the public comment uh process uh during city council and through that public information gathering process uh came up with a long list of pros, a little bit shorter list of cons that I'm not gonna read through for you.

Um I'm sure this will become some of part of the questions that you might pose to us today or part of the conversation uh for us today.

Um, and so in the interest of time, I'll let you read through those and then the timeline where we're at in the process.

So I'm always it's always great when we're ahead of schedule, and so um we're December 8th in budget and policy.

I think for some reason, um, if we wanted to switch the slide here, we had December 10th for budget and policy.

So we're ahead of the curve on the presentations, um, and then uh February 2026.

Uh we're looking to do public outreach meetings.

We'd love all your partnership.

Um, if you think that there's groups that uh would be really interested in this, please reach out to us and then uh budget and policy coming back to you uh in April of next year to get input again and show you what might have changed in the proposal again, stakeholder briefings in May, over the summer months, the governance committee, and hopefully um referring this to the ballot over the summer months with a November vote for uh the people of the city and county of Denver to uh allow us to look at a two-year budget process to have a little bit more oversight and input on our city budget, and so thank you to the partnership and the leadership of my colleagues, and uh we're I think ready for questions unless there's all of them.

Thank you, Council President.

Thank you.

Um, four council members in the queue, Lane, Torres, Tel Meeting, and Potem.

Anyone else?

All right, council members, starting.

Thank you for all the research in the presentation.

After the first presentation, I did a lot of reading on it myself, and I have to say I'm very, very skeptical.

Um a large number of jurisdictions, states and local governments that had biannual budgeting have moved away and gone back to annual versus the few that have gone from annual to two-year, and among the reasons they cite are concerns of mine.

We can't even get a one-year budget right.

So I'm very concerned.

Are you talking about a true two-year budget or are you talking about a rolling two-year budget where you have two years, but each year you re-pass the second year and then do the next beyond?

We couldn't forecast obviously what's happening right now with the economy, and I'm concerned that if we were in a two year in the middle of a two year cycle this year, it would have been very very difficult.

Uh, in addition, when we're moving into collective bargaining to have locked in two years of projections might not be the best uh course.

Um, you want us to respond to those three sure things first?

Sure.

Okay.

Was that three?

That was three.

So the first one was cities moving away right from that.

So interestingly, Matt had a conversation with Seattle about this because Seattle has a two-year budget cycle, and that was where we really landed on the option of a two-year budget cycle because uh two things number one the state of Colorado requires that you vote on a budget every year so we would have to vote on a budget every year right so um so the the sort of way to think about this would be big budget process in the first year with strategic plan and community outreach etc tweak budget year process in the second year right or um in the event of catastrophic change like we have unanticipated change like we saw in 2024 with the migrant crisis for example um then the budget would go to a one year budget cycle now in a place like Seattle they have a two-year budget cycle with this kind of option and they for the last few years have gone back to a one year budget cycle they actually like their two year budget cycle but just the way the economy has worked post COVID it just hasn't been the right opportunity to do a two year budget cycle according to them which is why they have been doing kind of one year at a time right now with the option to then go back to two year when the economy is a little bit more stable which is what we're could you clarify does that require is there a trigger that says okay when this has happened now we're back to one year or does that require more deliberation and a vote by the council to do that do you did they say I think they said it's by ordinance it's deliberation by ordinance and then you do it yeah at the beginning that's not an automatic thing all right uh just some follow up then could you uh find for us or send to us uh Fort Collins' strategic plan that maybe the la how long they've been doing it maybe if they've done two or three of these oh yeah they've been doing it for a long time and actually I will tell you um they have a fantastic website for their two year budget cycle um process which is a flexible two year budget cycle they can go down to one year if they want to um it's really helpful information and it's it's really big so I would recommend that everyone go to the Fort Collins website yeah Matt will get the link to everybody so that you have enough time suck with with what I do online already.

Yeah but it's great it's really it's very helpful I think to to understand a little bit more about like what we're envisioning.

Okay I'm just concerned that it could be very chaotic and make it more complicated and more mid-term mid budget votes reappropriations rescissions and things like that rather than an annual DOF do you think that's fine opine on that.

Good afternoon Justin Sykes budget management office director I think um there are pros and cons.

And I think we are we are um trying to evaluate what it is that's being proposed I think we may have a few ideas of our own I don't know that we have a definitive opinion on uh yes or no I think waiting until language is drafted waiting until we have time to sit down with other agencies to understand the pros and the cons to what what is ultimately proposed.

I do think it would be harder to project over two years it may save um some effort in that second small budget year but I don't know that uh department of finance at this point has a strong opinion I think we're uh still evaluating along with all of you maybe maybe clarify for us wow that echo really is where it really is annoying really maybe maybe maybe clarify for us when would the two years begin because would it straddle a change in administration or okay so the whoever's elected in 27 would not they would put that together okay that's good and then my last comment would be under the cons for a balanced budget uh the charter at 714 I think has a definition of a balanced budget I don't know for what you're how you're gonna tweak it but the third bullet proposed the con proposed budget still passes if city council fails it I saw that as a pro because we have to have a budget and the last budget we ended up with we must put into effect whether we voted down or we don't approve it.

Yeah no so do any of these cities proposal here that that change.

Okay, do any of these cities good.

Do any of these cities have a provision where if the council does not approve the budget that doesn't go into effect?

Um I mean there's no proposal here that that right so we didn't haven't studied that because that's just it was listed as a con, so I thought is that still in play?

Thank you.

That's all.

Thank you.

Next up, we have councilman Torres.

Thank you.

Um we're starting to get into I think just one of my questions around the pure city review and if they had um both things in charter and ordinance and how they divided that, that might be really interesting to kind of see um in kind of the next the next round.

Um I am interested.

I I felt like um the right place to start a two-year budget is at the start of a new term, right in that year.

So 27, starting that, so that you have the budget for 28 and 29.

So you're saying it wouldn't start until 28.

Yeah, so um we talked about this a little bit with the Department of Finance when we first brought this to them that we were kicking around the idea of something like this, and the year exactly right.

The biggest question was like where do we start, right?

How would we do this in a way that makes sense?

Um, and I think that in so in an election year, the uh administration is elected and sworn in in the middle of July, which is exactly six weeks before the budget is due to council, right?

So um to us it made more sense to have that be sort of a quote unquote tweak year.

I need to come up with a better term for it than tweak year, um, but to have it be a smaller budget year, so that kind of the cadence and the understanding of the budget can get under everyone's belt, and then that provides them the opportunity to do kind of the outreach and the big strategic planning and budget process for, you know, they will have been in office four months by the time that starts, right?

What I think is interesting.

I just wanted to add on to that, um, that you know, thinking back um July of 2023 when the emergency declaration was made the day after, and there was an immense outlay of resources looking at a budget year that would maybe be uh the second year would be a projected budget that they're operating off of, and then they would have to amend or rescind to there would just be more checks and balances, quite frankly, and when I look back on it, maybe that um duration from July to December of 2027, we would have had more planning time to just make sure that with the newcomer crisis happening at the same time.

I'd really be curious what that next budget outlay would look like, given all of those checks and balances in there.

So just wanted to add that in as well.

Yeah, I think what I was gonna mention was it feels like an interesting, and I don't know if it's better or not, to basically inherit your a predecessor's budget, right?

So uh I what I I'd love to just think about that a little bit more and try to figure out if there's if there is a right or feel a better answer that feels right.

Um that that would feel interesting, particularly if you're like I think about you know, if if Clerk Lopez had set my budget for my first year coming in and I had to just tweak it.

You know what I mean?

Like that that feels like I might want to go a totally different direction.

And well, that's what happens to the state.

Yeah, right.

I mean the governor of the state of Colorado inherits a budget and then they start their budget, and the way the reason it works that way is because they're on a um July 1st to June 30th budget cycle.

Yeah, right, and the but they're sworn in in January.

So maybe there's no right way, right?

Because you start like months after the department of finance has already started their discussions with um uh departments.

So agreed.

So I just had to kind of ask that piece.

Um, um, but I I do love being able to think about these things a little bit differently, and we always really struggle with the tight time frames to absorb a budget.

Even if you're really familiar with the process, it's still too much information to keep track of.

So totally appreciate y'all digging in and trying to find an alternative.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Um Franklin, I'll be there, so that's how long yet.

Thank you, Council President.

Um, I would agree.

I it's nice to question and look into this.

One of the things that I'm curious about that I don't quite understand yet is how does this help with transparency?

So the do you want to take that on the list, or you want me to do you can start?

Yeah, no, I'll read over it.

Let's be transparent about it.

I just so what we're thinking um is that right now the budget is created under the cover of the city of Denver, right?

There is no conversation with the public at all around what the budget looks like or what the community's priorities are.

And so what we see in the budget process is that you know we approve the budget, it's a pile of dollars without any projects associated with it.

And then January, February, March, April, May, each agency comes to us and they say, Here's what we're gonna do with the pile of dollars that you gave us, right?

Um there nowhere in there is there community conversation around what the community's priority is.

And so having this strategic plan that is helped create by the community created by the community in year one, um, that then provides the community something to compare to at the end of year two, were the projects that we brought forward that we said were priorities for us done by the city agencies at the end of year two, because let's be real, there's not a dotte or a parks project that only takes one year, right?

So at the end of that two years, the community has the opportunity to say, we brought forward um, you know, X Street, that is a major problem.

Was anything done about X Street at the end of that two years?

So that is where that transparency and accountability piece really comes in.

I wouldn't add anything.

We did great.

All right.

That's helpful.

I'm curious, could we not do some kind of more community engagement with the process we have now?

I mean, one, I would like more process time to review the budget, but I guess I just do have underlying concerns about a two-year long process with things that change, projections change, legislation changes, you know, now we have a new revenue source of two Q or caring for Denver.

And so we didn't know that at year one.

So is there a way to potentially integrate some of those transparency tools with a one-year budget?

So I think the short answer to that is probably no, because there's no project on the planet in Denver that takes one year.

So I think that the like comparison piece at the end where the community can say we brought this forward, right?

So I'll start here.

That's not city council's role, anyway, right?

That is the role of the mayor's office.

Could the mayor's office do that right now?

That would be up to them, right?

They're the administration, they do the operational side, they create the budget at the end of the day, and nothing about this proposal changes that.

So I think that's probably a question for the mayor's office on whether they have the um bandwidth and availability to do something like that every year.

Um to start with.

I would say it does impact the idea of the transparency and accountability piece because you're not gonna be able to know at the end of the year whether something was done or not.

It's just not that's just not the way projects in Denver work.

Yeah.

I would just say they also aren't done in two years.

I've been waiting on the mission for vision zero project that was supposed to be done before I was elected.

And I think it's out for our bid right now for the second time.

Your example is perfect.

I mean, that's actually and I kind of look at it as, you know, large nonprofit organizations when you're accountable to donors to um philanthropic groups.

Many times when you apply for multi-year funding, they require um projected out budgets to see how your staffing might change based on implementation of year two or three grant proposal dollars.

What you're leveraging as far as matching funds, which would be the same as federal um highway dollars that we might get or grade outdoors, Colorado dollars, caring for Denver, etc.

We don't get that information as we should, and so there's no way for the public to really wholeheartedly understand what is moving within the city that it's taking that vision zero project so long to get done, and it just give us better statistics, especially to look at communities of color, and when we're looking at increasing the amount of resources that might be needed to fix safety infrastructure, what does that look like five years now or six years out because we know the city agencies have those dollars and have it planned out because there'd be no way that they would not overspend their six year CIP budgets if they didn't have that information already?

So really all we're asking for is more transparency that would need to be provided that I think is information they already have because that's why they're not spending over at least their, you know, and annual general funds.

And to council McGillmore's point, we don't get the budget actuals, and so I think when we talk about transparency, I think we are trying to figure out what's the best that we can do in order to be able to make some tweaks um to have the public engaged in the conversation, understanding the limitations that we have under a strong mayoral form of government.

Great.

Um that's very helpful.

Uh, another question.

I just have a question around the state law that governs it requiring us to pass a budget every year, so we would pass an actual budget year one and the next year.

How would we still pass a budget?

You'd still pass the budget that you already proposed in the previous year, potential tweaks.

So the third year is the on year, and the second year is the off year with the the tweaks that council members.

We need to come up with a better word for it.

But yeah, I mean, I think um, you know, our economist Lisa Martinez Templeton, I will not speak for her, but I expect that she would say something along the lines of it's real difficult to um to budget with any accuracy over two years, right?

But what it does do is allow for sort of accuracy for the first year and a solid estimate for the second year, and then any minor changes that need to be made that second year get made, or if there's some sort of economic crisis that was unforeseen, major changes that happen that second year, right?

But um, I think you know, the public um city council, the city agencies, uh, I think it's really a benefit to everyone to be able to say, okay, uh, I am going to have nonprofit organizations who have to write grants and right now applications, and right now they're only for single years because we don't know we what we're gonna get in the program next year, right?

Being able to have that uh a solid idea of what is coming in year two opens up a lot of different possibilities that um right now just don't exist because we we cannot even have a conversation about 2027 until 2026 is you know three-quarters of the way done.

I'm sorry, no, I just wanted to add one of the opportunities that we are talking about is the strategic planning process, and I think that's that's a big deal in a conversation that we're not necessarily having in the context of the budget currently to have it attached to a strategic plan.

So when would that process be the strategic plan process within the two-year budget cycle?

Off year, okay.

So, would it happen before we proposed the first dual year budget?

So would it happen the year before we propose our first dual year budget?

So, like if it started in 28, would 27 be the year that we create the strategic plan?

No, it would be 29, right?

So we would create the first budget without strategic plan.

Correct.

Okay, sorry.

I'm thinking in well, it was a complicated um uh proposal, and so when you create uh budget for 2028, let's say, with it, you're getting a kind of more like a proposed budget for 2029.

Is that kind of yeah, I would say both 2028 and 29 would still be a proposed budget, and they'd both be flexible to what is actually necessary in terms of what the city needs.

Um, but certainly on the 2029 proposed, yes.

Okay, I'm just thinking through how that would work, and I think that makes sense that it's like proposed because I would assume there would be probably a lot of times major tweaks to that potential budget depending on what changes have happened.

So something I'll continue to think about.

Thank you all for digging into it.

I guess it depends on what comes up.

Yeah.

The thing that concerns me about that is just the false sense of certainty that people might have because they're saying, oh, well, this is funded in 2029, and then it turns out come 2029, and we're not we're having to cut said budget, you know, look at what's happening with Denver human services right now, for example, with the state legislature, things like that.

So it's a certainty that's not certain, but we are going through that 2026 as we speak, so that's interesting.

Yeah, and I will just say that's exactly what Seattle told us, right?

And exactly why they went back to one-year budgets for a little while here during this time of economic uncertainty.

Thank you, thank you, Council President.

Thank you.

Um, Councilmember Waxton.

Thank you, Madam President, and thank you for bringing this forward.

It's interesting to kind of think about, you know, how we tweak it.

I think we all kind of complain about the budget process.

Um, so this is just an interesting one.

Uh my question is around a little bit more around the strategic planning process and what that looks like, and how do other you know, cities, how have they done their strategic planning process, who runs it?

So it's strategic planning with the mayor, council, departments, community, like how can you just talk a little bit more about what they've done?

Yeah, in Denver Strongway or form of government, it's the mayor's office responsibility to do the outreach and set the strategic plan.

So they would have to make the determination of what that outreach process looks like.

So if the mayor is setting the strategic plan, then that's something that then the council like what is our participation.

Do we approve it?

Do we I'm just trying to figure out like if if we're doing a two-year process, um, how does the council weigh into that strategic plan?

Exactly the same thing.

And right, I mean, we meet we set our budget priorities, um, we have conversations about not only kind of the large budget priorities, but what the programmatic priorities are underneath each of those.

I think we have eight now budget priorities.

Um, right, so nothing about that changes.

That's still what we do.

That's how we provide our feedback to the mayor's office on what we want the budget to look like.

That's exactly how it works now.

Um, so the the piece that would change in this would be however the mayor's office does the community outreach piece um that they want to do in the creation of the strategic plan.

Because at the end of the day, your our budget is a reflection of our values, right?

Already today.

The mayor's office is already setting a strategic plan with their budget, they're just not saying those words, and they're not including the community in the conversation, right?

So um, so and you can look at our budget book and you can see that that is a hundred percent true, right?

That there are dollars that are being appropriated to the priorities of the mayor.

Um, and that is the way it works in a strong mayor form of government.

That's not to say judgment one way or another on that, but that's the way it works right now.

Um, so nothing about that would change.

What I think would really change in terms of the strategic plan piece would be the inclusion of the community in that strategic plan conversation, and the vocalizing from the mayor's office of what that strategic plan really looks like over the next two years.

That's really helpful to understand because I think when we say okay, this is how we do it now, so basically what this would do, and it would very clearly articulate that there needs to be a strategic plan that we're being is that part of the transparency that you're also talking about for setting what those goals are, and then in the tweak year, um modifications to either strategic plan and or the budget priorities within that.

Is that yeah, I think that's right, and I just I can't I thought of another good example for you.

Um so when we look at the P and I program, right?

Place network investigations program that is done within our police department uh with a cross-agency um support group, um, focusing on the highest areas of the highest gun violence in our city to reduce that gun violence.

Um that kind of a project to do a one-year goal for it.

Like, remember last year um that goal was not achieved because it was close, but it was not achieved because um you it takes a long time to build a stoplight or a crosswalk or add in you know additional lighting or things like that, right?

So something like that for the mayor's office to say we have a strategic plan that says we are going to reduce gun violence in these locations by X amount, and then they have two years to achieve that goal, that makes a lot more sense and makes the goal achievable because the full project could be done in that period of time.

The lights could be added in along with the other, you know, pieces of it that come from um a lot of different agencies.

So um so I think that that's a really good example of where that transparency clear and clarity comes in.

The mayor's office is already saying what their strategic plan is, it's just not uh it's just one year is too short of a time to really get the metrics in place to determine the success of that strategic plan.

I want to add on to that um with the two-year planning process with PNI.

You know, it might be lighting, it might be traffic signals, but then what if year two look like more nonprofit resources went to use serving organizations to continue to engage young people or families, etc.

That planning and even that articulation of higher level thought process than we have January through December, and that's all we're gonna look at, gives I think reassurance and trust to the community that we're not just doing something, but there's a plan on it, and that you can see that represented in the second year projected budget, and then you know, I don't know how many times we've all heard.

Well, we're building the plane as we're flying it.

That is not a strategic plan, and I'll just leave that right there.

So, um, uh DRC, I I also put in the chat for the budget and policy, Fort Collins, their example, and so it talks about the revision, like what they do in terms of thinking about those most critical um programs that we might that you might need during like tight financial um circumstances um or um budget shortfalls, and so you can read more about like what they do in terms of the strategic plan as well as the revisions uh when things come up, yeah.

Thank you.

And then I know that I'm a little bit lost in the in the start.

So it would strategic plan would happen in 2027, to have to be implemented into the 2028.

So, we think so.

We can't the mayor can't set a strategic plan until they're elected, right?

So I think part of the challenge is trying to figure out like what year makes sense to start it.

We think 2028, but like that's why we didn't put it in here because we're not sure yet, and that's why we're coming back to budget and policy in April after we've kind of worked through all of this stuff, like it the when do we start this is a hard question.

Um, and I think the mayor's office probably has an opinion about that.

I think the Department of Finance probably has an opinion about that, you know.

So um, so there's we still need to kind of figure that out.

I don't think, based on the conversations that we've had and the timeline that we're looking at, it would make sense to start it before 2028.

So it would be new class in 2020.

2020 would do it for the twenty twenty-eight.

Got it.

Okay.

Yeah.

And so maybe it is that the strategic planning processes is either end of twenty-seven or early twenty-eight.

And then it's actually the twenty-nine and 30 budgets where it ends up being fully implemented.

I don't I mean, if you guys have thoughts on that, let us know.

It's just we could do we won't be able to do it next year, which would be the other way we could do it because we can't, we're not gonna have this ready for a ballot until next November.

Yeah.

Yeah, okay.

Yeah.

I appreciate that.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you, Councilmember Watson.

Thank you, Council President.

Thank you all so much for looking into this.

I mean, the budget process is one of our primary roles for council.

And so I appreciate it.

Um I wanna the one thing that I've been trying to separate in my brain, and we've got lots of time for this to be clear, so not so much of a question.

Budget process and project strategic planning process attached to the outcomes of the budget.

I've always separated the two.

A budget is not a project list, it's a budgeting process based on forecast, looking department by department, etc.

And so um looking at the strategic planning process that the mayor's office does.

Um, I think there are steps that we can take now and collaboration to make sure we're increasing our transparency, increasing our communication quarterly updates, re-forecasting, all of that stuff.

So I think the two-year plan um for our two-year budget, I still need to wrap um based on the next two years of slow economic growth.

I think maybe possibly even through 2028.

This truly may not even be implemented because we would start to do annual budgets.

So my team hasn't done any of our researches yet.

We're pulling all of this information.

The things that I would like to see if you all have it.

If you don't, obviously we'll we'll find it.

We got time.

Um, which um uh municipalities have strong mayor form of government, similar to what we're doing here in in Denver.

Um, what um so I can give you that list.

That'll be good if you've got that list, that would be helpful.

Um, it's San Francisco, Seattle, um, and what's the third one, Matt?

Come on, Matt.

That's a chart.

I'll email you the yeah, we had uh the ledge services do research to give us the.

So those three would be great, and then um we already talked a lot about swinging.

Um, I don't know, I I don't know.

Well we talked a little bit about a swinging of the the budget, the budget swings.

That would be my only unpredictability forecasting, we don't forecast beyond maybe two or three quarters, much less two, you know, yeah, two years.

So those are where my stickiness is at.

Don't have a ton of questions.

First one, first time looking and reading on it, but um I'm looking at a strategic plan and project planning process as consistently, at least the work I've done, separate from a budget.

We did a five-year plan for Department of Housing Stability when it first um opened up.

Every year, since that five-year plan and the iterative um one year, two-year reviews, they've done budgeting based on that five-year plan, but that five year plan was not in their initial budget because it's iterative based on impacts, impact, outcomes, targets they've met, things they haven't.

Uh so that's where my concern comes in to a project stakeholdering process tied back to two-year budget outcomes, where we don't end projects in two years, how would do we balance that?

No questions there.

I appreciate the process you all are going through, but it's not it's it's different from my thinking of project planning, strategic planning, and budgeting.

I still see those are two different lines, um, and it sounds like they're commingling a little bit here.

Um, that's just my thoughts.

Yeah, if I really appreciate that.

I will just respond by saying um they're commingled in the minds of our residents already.

Yeah, right.

And so um the proposal that we're bringing forward to you here today is really trying to address kind of what we hear from our residents, which is that it is commingled, that to us, as e you know, when we look at a budget that is based on forecasts and it's a pile of dollars that goes to an agency, we do not budget on a programmatic level, etc.

Um, that is commingled in the minds of our residents already.

So the question is how do we realize that, accept that, and shape a budget process that includes them and accepts that co-mingling better, um, in a way that kind of creates that transparency and accountability and metrics piece at the end of the day.

Well, look forward to having that discussion.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Thank you all for the great discussion.

My one question.

Oh, Councilmember, put in the.

Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.

I didn't see you go ahead.

Councilman.

Just real quick.

So as far as the following process goes, I kind of heard you saying that there would that this would this require a public process for the mayor's office?

Okay.

So then they but it's up to them how they would determine how that process would be.

Okay.

And then would you consider any language about since we're in budget and policy, about the amendment process, right?

So when council members bring forward amendments to the budget, there's oftentimes this kind of back and forth of well, we can put in a bring an amendment forward, but it the but the mayor's office doesn't have to operationalize it in the way that we think that they might, right?

In that amendment.

And so one of the things that I've been thinking about is is it possible to make it so that that is required?

Like if there are amendments that are that are voted on by council and that are adopted by the body that those should then be implemented as as said in the amendment, not up to, and I know this like kind of gets at that like strong mayor form of government.

I get that, but I just I just thought I'd put it out there since we're here.

I think it's totally fair question.

Yeah, and it's actually something I mean it a number of commenters brought up even like an independent department of treasury um for the city for this very same reason.

I would say that gets real close to undermining a strong mayor form of government, and um I'm not sure that's the problem we're trying to solve here.

Gotcha.

Okay.

That said, like I don't know, that's why we're here on budget policy.

You guys tell us.

Like, is that something you would want to see?

I don't open to it.

I I think we don't even necessarily agree with each other on what that looks like.

Um, so I think that there's more conversation to be had on that, but I would say that toes real close to the line of undermining entirely of what a strong mayor form of government is, and perhaps that's a different charter change.

Okay, thanks, thank you.

Yeah, I would just say for that, what my thoughts are is we're moving money, and if you want to have a policy attached with it, then run the policy, and then have it follow the money, right?

Like, so I do when I've done all those like um overlay extravaganza in Northwest Denver, I always came and made sure that we were funding CPD with planners because I knew I was gonna do ADUs and the overlay extravaganzas, and I needed those people to help me move that those pieces of legislation.

So that's how my mind worked to not undermine the mayor's strong form of government.

My if I could get in the queue first, or go ahead.

I just want to hire on what uh councilman said here.

I would imagine that in Fort Collins, the city manager has the same responsibility as the strong mayor, so the city council and Fort Collins also can't direct the city manager to spend the money the way they've said if the city manager sees other ways to spend that, depending on revenues and whatnot.

So I just wanted to point that out.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So my one question that I always think come to me is are we giving away council power?

And in this situation, I haven't determined that yet, but that's something that I'm gonna think about.

I can think I can see on the off year for lack of a better word, giving away some council power because we do have the power to amend, we do have the power, like our biggest power is being able to um have the budget come to us.

I really like the time frame of giving us more time this week.

I actually gave you this time.

I actually gave you all a week before budget hearings.

I was gonna try to spread it out over two weeks, which we have done before, and if we spread budget hearings out over two weeks, so it's not a consolidated week, you'd have three days.

You'd have Saturday, Friday when it drops, Saturday, Sunday, and we'd start budget hearings.

And I was like, I as much as I wanted to give you all much that much time, I gave you a week to review it, which I still don't agree with.

It's too much.

Um, so I really like the idea of pushing back that date.

The only thing that I've done is is your council president when that July budget drops.

I do look at city council.

Ours doesn't move, fluctuate very much compared to your to compare to when it comes out in September.

So I can usually give that as a starting point, and I'll sit down with Benita and I'll say, look, here's what came out in July.

So then I'm attempting to figure out what you all would get in your budget and how much your budget grew so that I can understand city council's budget.

So that's the only thing I really do for the July that I personally use in that July drop date.

So I always am looking at that.

I'm always looking at council, I'm always dividing it, taking out centrals, and then I'll look at it and I'll say, Okay, Gina, compared to last year, what is our growth or how did we grow?

And what do we need to grow?

Because as for those of us who've been here a long time know that city council hasn't grown, we have to always ask for a budget amendment to grow, which it's complicated.

Um, but as I'm sitting thinking about it, I would love that all the research and the peer research to figure out like my initial pass at this feels like we're giving away council power, and I'm never gonna want to give away council power because once we give it away, it's hard.

I remember when councilwoman um Sessman was council president, she wanted to make the contract up to a million dollars.

I've been thinking, should we drop it down to 250,000 dollars?

So because a half a million dollars is a lot, so you don't see anything for 4999.

So, how do we?

How do we actually see actuals?

You can't.

Because a lot of things can come in under 499, 999, and so should we actually look at taking that number down, which means that we have more work in front of us because more contracts would come through, which means the contracts for 250,000, you know, or two for nine nine nine nine would go under, but it as we all know, it's hard to do work under that amount of money.

Uh a lot of work can get done under a half a million dollars, and so when I've been explaining people, how do they know that like how do I not know certain people are on contract in the city?

And I'm like, Well, because it was probably a contract under 4999.

I never saw it, and they're like, What do you mean I never saw it?

I said it's not something I vote on, and I would have to literally hire one city council aide to go to the clerk and recorder and re go through the whole entire clerk and recorder, all the recorded um things that come in.

And the reason I know that is because I remember one time during COVID, I was having coffee with our current clerk and recorder, and I had no idea some of the contracts that were coming in.

Um, if you all remember during COVID in New York, they had that mass grave site, and they were putting people on that island in the mass grave site in with um all that safety gear look like apocalyptic, right?

We were planning for that in Denver.

I had no idea we were doing that because that contract was under 4999.

I never saw it until Clerk Lopez brought it up to my to my attention, and I was like, wait, what?

We did what?

Um, because the clerk does sign those.

So I have thought about how do we have more transparency, how do we have more public engagement, how do we have all these things?

And I'll just say is sitting on this side, it has been hard with that 4999.

I think that's how Flock first got implemented, right?

And then now it's underneath that threshold again, where we don't have a say at City Council.

Um, I remember my colleague, uh I told him I was like, you have to tell councilwoman Sussman, no way would you vote to push the threshold up to a million dollars.

We would never see anything in the city and county of Denver.

Um so I've never I don't know if we've ever had that conversation.

Should we push the threshold down?

I don't know what that would look like.

I've never had that conversation, but since we're at budget and policy, these are the things that I've thought about sitting as council president looking at our work, knowing just like even to get our 150 special revenue fund, it's hard to do work under a certain amount of money.

Um, so I just appreciate this conversation, but just as for the sponsors, you all you'll always know.

I'm never gonna be a found if it feels like we're giving away council power.

And I feel like a couple times we have given it away since um I've been on council and I've always regret it's like I don't regret my vote very often, but I have regretted those votes where I'm like, dang it.

Um, one of them, I I don't think I was on council, I think it was the three who are here when we went from resolutions being two readings to one reading, and then we created the rule for the 3.56.

I've looked back at that, and how many times have we used rule three?

We use it a lot.

Like we use it a lot.

So I remember when Kanit brought that back and brought that forward and her whole rationale.

I think Councilman Espinosa voted on it.

I was a council aid, I did research on it, and now sitting here I'm like, dang, I don't really like that we have the resolutions on one reading and it goes so fast, and it's all these contracts and they're huge contracts, right?

I think Councilman Sawyer, that's why you actually started with the um wanting to have a come in if on call contracts because then the on-call contracts were at least two readings, so at least you gotta familiarize yourself.

One reading, you're done.

If you don't pay attention, it's gone.

And it could be gone for like five years, and you don't get a second chance at it because it was a run of one reading, so because it used to be two resolutions, used to be two.

So those are just the kinds of things that I've often thought about um sitting here and oftentimes do we get to go back and reflect on our work of is the intention correct?

Is are the things that we're actually implementing?

And I'll throw myself under the bus because I always like to be a leader in shape.

Hey, I have when I passed the overlay for active street use.

I had to go to councilman Torres and Councilmember Clark, and they had to run an amendment because I hadn't thought about what if you have two primary streets.

So I had a huge parcel assemblage in Northwest Denver, and they weren't gonna use active street use on the whole entire tenny quarter because they're like, oh, 46, it's like this this wide, and I was like, You're not gonna do that.

That's not the intent.

You have to use Tennyson, and they're like, Oh, it's not in the overlay, you can't make us.

So, luckily we caught it, and they were able to run an amendment as they were implementing it on Santa Fe.

Um, but that was because I had put a year in timer and I asked my aide, go back, start meeting with the planners.

Is this actually being implemented to the way and oftentimes we don't have that work because a lot of times we're being so reactive, and I hear that you all are wanting to be proactive in this work, and I'm always trying to figure out how we turn our work to more proactive.

It's really challenging, especially in this dynamic that we are all living in today with the federal government, the state government, and here in Denver.

Can I just ask you a follow-up question?

Yeah, I just like I I want to know more about what you mean when you say council is giving up power with us.

We are, yeah.

Because that I don't, I don't very little changes, if anything, except we get more time and more ability to actually like dig into all of these things.

So, like, what do you mean?

On that off year, would we have budget hearings?

Well, that would be up to the council president, yeah.

Well, or it'd be up to mayor, because the mayor could say no too.

I can set them, I can't direct the mayor to have them.

So I can't really do that.

I've I've had the conversation.

Hey, I want to set council budget hearings, and but he has to tell his agencies to show up.

He has to tell, or she or he, let's say let's not use pronouns because we don't know what the future holds.

They have to tell their agencies to show up, they have to tell their agencies to get us the information, they have to tell their agencies to participate.

How's that different from the way it is today?

So I would just add a year if we have we could pass that.

So on the off year, I'm just thinking, what if we have a mayor that says I'm not gonna have budget hearings?

We do we can still run budget amendments.

You could still run budget amendments.

I'm hearing that, but I'm just wondering, does it it does it give?

I don't know the answer?

So I'm just that's the question that I thought.

Like, how would it run on that quote unquote tweet year off year?

I I'm so happy for the question.

That's gonna give away council power ever.

Ever, ever.

And so, you know, I mean I I'm sure somebody else here has it, but um, you know, I'm getting a tally of how many amendments over the past 10 years Denver City Council has passed, and what that total number is.

I would venture it's easily under 15 million.

Let's just aim high that maybe council over the last 10 years has gotten 15 million dollars total in council um amendments by the second year, the the projected budget year, it's a way for taxpayers, for residents, for council members to have a reconciliation of where the administration was in that last year or that last half year.

They're gonna be required to provide us with more relevant documentation for us to actually have that reconciliation for then the second year, and I think it makes perfect sense that it's tied to the strategic planning process because then neighborhoods can come forward and I think of you know, um, I think of different areas along that adverted L.

Wouldn't it be great for those neighborhoods to be able to come back on that second projected year and say, well, you know, the strategic plan that we showed up to all those community meetings that the mayor's administration did.

We said that we want this traffic signal here, we want that there, we want these specific things in the budget.

It's an opportunity for the administration to show up on that second um projection year to actually show what they have done and that they have a plan moving forward instead of where we're at right now, is I've sent over my traffic signal list and the six-year CIP list to Dottie, asking them to give me updates so I can share it with my constituents at the beginning of next year.

I have zero idea if any of those 11 traffic signals, beyond the one that you know, we or the one or two that we negotiated in the vibrant Denver bond, I have zero assurance that any of those are gonna get addressed, and so that's the thinking around my um reasoning for supporting this is if on that second provision that second projected year we could shore up and reconcile all of those promises that were made by the administration, and we're the checks and balances.

We're the ones that vote aye or nay on any of the contracts and any of the budgets, and so I actually think it gives us great negotiation power for the administration, whoever they might be, to show their work to all of us, but then especially the taxpayers.

So I I agree with that, but we have strategic plans, and we have um neighborhood planning initiatives that we vote on right now that aren't being implemented on, and so this could be just another plan where they come around and say, Yeah, we were supposed to work on that, and we were supposed to do that, and they're not led by us.

They are led by the administration.

I do not lead my neighborhood plan.

I participate, I give feedback on it, and I vote on it, and there are so many planning documents in the city and county of Denver.

I will never forget when Joan Clark did that exercise, and he went through every single one of the planning documents that we have in the city and county of Denver that we don't implement.

So I just don't want this to be another way another thing where it's like okay, this is the strategic plan.

Squirrel, we did something different and and and it doesn't work out because I could just see that happening because we have so many planning initiatives with the city, and once again, this is not us helping lead the strategic plan, it's the mayor's office and the mayor's administration leading a strategic plan, which they do for all things.

They lead the strategic plan for hosts, they lead the strategic planning process for MPIs.

They lead the strategic planning process for like night like what 90% of the stuff we do, except for the surveys that you we all do for our offices, and sometimes those fall flat and they don't get implemented.

Um that's a way to hold people accountable, and we still don't.

So those are just some of my initial thoughts.

Yeah, I I just I'm gonna respond to that.

I think you'll push back on that a little bit because an MPI is a 30-year plan.

We're talking about a two-year budget, right?

There is there is not a there's not an option to not implement it, it's the budget.

Like it has to be implemented, um, right?

The MPI plans are 30-year visions of what the a neighborhood will look like in another generation.

Um, so I think we're comparing apples and oranges with that a little bit, um, not a little bit, we are comparing apples and oranges with that.

I also think that um you know a the idea that like we could write into this charter change whatever we want, right?

Um, I think there is a line that we have to responsibly walk that says that recognizes that we are a strong mayor form of government, and so um I think if we wanted to write in that city council has to be bought in in a different way to this outreach process and strategic planning process, we could do that.

I don't know that that would be the right thing to do based on our form of government.

So, like I hear you, but I also think like that's a very we have we have to be really careful, and although I will be frank, I don't feel like we have been shown respect as counsel from the administration in several ways, like I am going to be better than that, and I am going to show them the respect that I wish they would give me.

So um I think we probably we've kicked around this a little bit too, and right, like there's just there's something we have to, there's a line we have to be cognizant of and decide whether we want to cross it or not.

I think that's what this committee's for.

Thank you.

Yeah, but I agree.

We can't we have this the firm the form of government we have, and that's that.

I appreciate the dialogue, um, council president.

I guess one thing that came up for me is what like did you envision a way in which maybe we could have some discussions about where council could be brought in differently in terms of like your concerns with us giving up power, like what did what could it look like in terms of this proposal that you would feel that we weren't giving up power in that second year?

I would just have to see the language because I the language matters right that we were referred to.

This is just that's just my that's just my first thought is having a two-year budget cycle.

Um, if I were coming in in one of the off years, how could I make a big impact in my community on that off year?

I don't know how that feels like when you all came into council.

We worked really hard on making sure that you all have the budget that you wanted so that you could set your priorities that your predecessor couldn't use all the budget, unlike some of my colleagues that didn't have that.

Um, and so wanting just to make sure that when a new class comes in that you that new class feels like they also have power to be able to impact the budget if it is on an off-year, yeah.

Come to the first, I feel like is in line with the question around what's in charter and what's an ordinance because um uh charter could provide for flexibility, the ordinance can provide for specificity around um what could happen in that B year, right?

Of um uh still required to hold uh hearings unless council waves, um, still required to hold public hearing unless council waves like I I feel like there could be those kinds of things built into the ordinance side of it that that just are a little too like nuancy for the charter, yeah.

Yeah, and I mean there's no language drafted at all, right?

Um, but I do it will be there will have to be a companion ordinance for this.

So I think those are great ideas in terms of how we ensure that we're um walking the right line, but not giving up kind of the right to have those things.

I can totally see the department in that second year going, okay, here's what's changed for us, here's where we need more funding because of what's coming, or where we didn't get spend it all because of acts, and we'd like to, you know, the word that could be that check-in for that refinement before the end of the year for that second year budget.

I could totally see that being a different kind of presentation than what we get every year right now.

Okay.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Last-minute thoughts, all right.

Thank you all.

Thanks.

Remember, we're taking a photo, I think at three-ish in the chamber before it gets you.