The Budget, Finance and Audit Standing Committee met on Wednesday, May 20, 2026, with Vice Chair Letitia Johnson presiding and Councilmember Mary Waters present. Councilmember Denzel McCampbell was absent. The committee addressed a lengthy agenda including unfinished business, new business, and a major discussion on a Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) proposal for the City Club Apartment project.
Joining us for the budget finance and audit standing committee on today, Wednesday, May 20th, 2026. Mr. Clerk, will you please call the roll? Good afternoon, Councilmember Denzel McCampbell. Member McCampbell did indicate that he would not be present today. Clerk will still know. Councilmember Letitia Johnson. Present. Councilmember Mary Waters. Present. And Vice Chair, there's a quorum. Thank you. Having a quorum present, we are now in session. And good afternoon, everyone. Member Waters, is there a motion on the minutes? Hearing no objections, that action shall be taken. We are going to move into public comment. If there is anyone joining us who'd like to make a public comment, whether in person or virtually, please raise your hand. Please raise your hand. Noting that we do not have any hands raised in the committee of the whole, we will cut off the collection of general public comment at 10. That is in two minutes. Good morning, Miss Duncan. How many hands do we have raised virtually? Good morning, Madam Chair. There are currently nine hands raised. All right, let's give everyone two minutes. And we will get started with the first caller. The first caller, Madam Chair is Mr. Foster. Mr. Foster, good afternoon. You have two minutes for general public comments. Oh good afternoon, duty, chair. All right. I appreciate a lot of direction that we're going, but we still have a technical parkers and y'all are here. For example, a 6.23. If we're talking about making new changes and make it sure our neighborhood visits straight and all these other things that how we meant doing things in lieu of taxes. The whole purpose of taxes are there to ensure that the services are rendered until the people, right? That's all even though this is a new ordinance. I'll just ask you all to evaluate the effectiveness of it and then have a force going to down the line, maybe the consequences of these things. We can't continue to do these things, waiting on income to come in three, four years later with a new administration, possibly, right? You know, and so we cannot afford to gamble our resources. And that's what it appears to be. Not trying to get anybody in trouble or pull everybody's coach here. But like for example, if we did a 75 million dollar deal in November, and this deal is contingent upon state reps and senators and everything else, and they are on the ballot to get elected this year. How are we moving if we don't even know what position that the state is in or anybody else is in? Where are we the first people committing our funds and money to these type of things? Thank you. And so those are just names like we have to change our mind to think and stop trying to play on our citizens' uh illiteracy or a lack of understanding into government, right? Be admiral people, be moral people.