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OPENPUBLICA · PUBLIC MEETING RECORD

Record of Proceedings

City Council FY27 Proposed Budget Presentation and Discussion - May 18, 2026

Committees and Commissions — Monday, May 18, 2026

BodyHouston, Texas

SessionCommittees and Commissions

DateMonday, May 18, 2026

StatusFILED

Video Record

0:00 / 31:39

Transcript — VerbatimClick a line to jump · ⧉ to share it

0:21

Staff from Council Member Alejandra Salinas's office and I see Councilmember.

0:26

Joaquin Martinez in the horse sheet coming to the horseshoe now.

0:31

So with that, we will welcome our favorite department, City Council with the Finance Assistant Director Vernita Jones and Merrick Hamilton.

0:41

Great to see you guys.

0:44

The floor is yours.

0:45

Alrighty.

0:46

Good morning.

0:47

My name is Vernita Jones, and this morning I will be presenting City Council's FY27 proposed budget.

0:55

Next slide, please.

0:57

So before I start, I would like to introduce my team.

1:03

We have Merrick and the other team members here.

1:06

These are the individuals that help City Council every day.

1:09

They are very vital to the 16 great people that you see right here that's running your city, and they help them daily, weekends, evenings.

1:20

My office is always there to assist them.

1:23

And I do want to add something else that when you get up here, people always talk about their staff and their team.

1:28

I want to say that this is my team, and you all don't get enough recognition.

1:33

They recognize everybody else.

1:35

Everybody always comes and hammers you all, but they don't give you what you need as far as recognition and appreciation.

1:42

So I want to appreciate the council members as my team.

1:45

Next slide, please.

1:47

So today I am going to go over City Council's office breakdown, the alignment that they have, budget comparisons, the increases and decreases for FY27, Council's expenditures.

2:00

I'm gonna do a small overview of the council district service fund.

2:04

We're gonna do the budget programs, and then I'm gonna go into a detailed um spreadsheet for the council district service fund, and we're gonna do the priorities and initiatives.

2:13

Next slide, please.

2:16

So we have the city council's organizational chart, and for FY27, we have approximately 91.6 staffers that will be there.

2:24

You can see the budget for this year is 16,965,724.

2:31

That proposed budget consists of 16 council office, which you see in the organization chart.

2:37

Each budget for the council office is six hundred and sixty-six thousand five hundred and ten dollars.

2:42

We also have the health benefits on there and council district service funds.

2:47

Next slide, please.

2:49

The demographics for FY26, we had 53 females and 31 males.

2:54

The ethnicity, we had 29 Hispanic Latinos, 26 white, 26 black African American, and three Asian Pacific Islanders.

3:04

Next slide, please.

3:05

The strategic alignment for city council, and as you know, I'm speaking as council as a whole.

3:11

And the city council members, as I stated before, they are great individuals, all six of them.

3:15

16 of them worked work diligently to help the city with the mayor's priorities, which are infrastructure, quality of life, public safety, and government that works.

3:27

And as you can see through the town halls and the workshops that the council members have throughout the year, that brings on the citizens' engagement and that helps them to reach this vision of victory that they're trying to accomplish with the city of Houston.

3:41

Next slide, please.

3:44

So I will give you a comparison of FY26 to FY27's budget.

3:49

The adopted budget in FY26 was 19,246,137, and it is broken down as you can see on the side.

3:59

13,063,996 was the actual operating budget that we had, and it was $624,023 per office.

4:09

There was also a budget amendment that was approved and added on for SWAT, which is the stormwater action team.

4:17

Each council district office received 279,000 dollars and the health benefit was 6 to allocate to a project of their choosing.

4:33

That gives you your adopted budget.

4:36

Then presently, our current budget is 22,566,698.

4:42

The adjustments were the restricted accounts, which are basically your IT accounts.

4:47

Then we had a council district service fund carry forward of 3,323,451.

4:54

To explain the carry forward, that are those are the council service budgets that are not completed within the fiscal year.

5:02

All these projects are submitted and approved, but as you know, there are over 300 projects that they get, and a lot of times they're not able to finish them before the end of the fiscal year.

5:11

Those projects and the funds are carried forward to the next fiscal year.

5:16

That is what it means by carry forward.

5:18

Then we have a health benefit adjustment of 14,000.

5:21

That gives you your current budget.

5:23

The proposed budget is now 16,965,724, giving each office $666,510.

5:35

Also included is the $5,500,000 for the council district service fund and your health benefits budget.

5:43

Next slide, please.

5:45

So this is just the increases that you see.

5:47

We had to hope for full-time, hope for part-time, elected officials increase, the pension increase, IT increased, and then we had the health benefits increase.

5:58

Next slide, please.

6:00

The decreases were you see the first four are all from the IT department, and then they reduced our budget by the three million that was given to us last year for SWAT, and then they also reduced the carry forward for the council district service fund.

Discussion Breakdown — Share of Meeting

Fiscal Sustainability█████████████████████████████████████████████65%

Community Engagement████████11%

Public Engagement████████11%

Parks and Recreation██████8%

Public Safety███5%

Summary of Proceedings

City Council FY27 Proposed Budget Presentation and Discussion

On May 18, 2026, the City Council held a budget workshop to review the FY27 proposed budget for the City Council office. Vernita Jones, Finance Assistant Director, presented the budget overview, including staff demographics, expenditure comparisons, the Council District Service Fund, and program details. The proposed total budget is $16,965,724, with each council office receiving $666,510. The presentation highlighted a 93% personnel cost ratio and a 70% reduction in paper and printing across council offices. Council members and public speakers engaged in detailed Q&A about fund allocations, carryovers, and transparency.

Public Comments & Testimony

Astrid Lang asked about health insurance cost trends and noted she helps proofread notes from council meetings. She received a response that health benefits are pooled across council and projected to increase by about 3%.
Laura Gallier questioned the transparency of district fund expenditures, particularly HPD overtime and flock cameras. She also asked how residents can apply for project funding. Council members Huffman and Martinez explained that funds are constituent-driven and require department sponsorship. Laura also asked about the $400,000 golf course project in District I; Councilmember Martinez explained it addresses safety issues on Wayside near Gus Wortham Golf Course. Laura confirmed that at-large members do not have district or metro funds.
Rain Eatman inquired about translation services allocation (budget of $438,000 for Office of New Americans), the possibility of council members using multi-service centers for satellite offices without using district funds, and whether HOT team expenses could be shifted back to HPW/Solid Waste to free up district funds. Council members noted that satellite offices require lease costs and that shifting HOT team expenses would require conversation with solid waste.

Discussion Items

Budget Presentation (Vernita Jones): Provided detailed breakdown of FY26 adopted ($19,246,137), current ($22,566,698), and proposed FY27 ($16,965,724) budgets. Key components: each council office $666,510; Council District Service Fund $5.5 million (projects up to $300,000 each); metro funds $500,000 per district (mobility-related). SWAT (stormwater action team) funding of $279,000 per office in FY26 was a one-time budget amendment. Carryover from FY26 was $3,323,451; FY27 carryover amount is unknown until end of fiscal year. Personnel is 93% of council budget.
Councilmember Ramirez asked about the organizational chart showing 6.8 FTEs for his office, noting he only has 3 full-time and 1 part-time. Jones explained the average is calculated for budget allocation. He also asked about elected official pay increase of $148,560 (divided by 16 council members, tied to Harris County judges' salary).
Councilmember Martinez responded to Laura's question about the golf course project, stating it was a priority due to increased golf rounds and safety concerns on Wayside, with partnership from the Houston Golf Association.
Councilmember Huffman and Carter added that district funds address specific local issues like illegal dumping or homelessness, and at-large members can contribute excess funds to district projects.
Vice Chair Castillo and others expressed appreciation for the council staff team.

Key Outcomes

No formal votes were taken. The budget presentation provided clarity on fund allocations, carryover procedures, and the distinction between district service funds and metro funds.
It was noted that paper and printing costs across council have decreased by 70% (from $107,000 to $31,000) and citywide by 23%.
Councilmembers confirmed that residents can request projects by contacting their district council office; all projects require city department sponsorship and legal review.
The council will continue budget workshops, including a solid waste budget hearing later that day.
Further information on translation services usage and multi-service center office space will be provided to Rain Eatman.

Meeting Transcript

Staff from Council Member Alejandra Salinas's office and I see Councilmember. Joaquin Martinez in the horse sheet coming to the horseshoe now. So with that, we will welcome our favorite department, City Council with the Finance Assistant Director Vernita Jones and Merrick Hamilton. Great to see you guys. The floor is yours. Alrighty. Good morning. My name is Vernita Jones, and this morning I will be presenting City Council's FY27 proposed budget. Next slide, please. So before I start, I would like to introduce my team. We have Merrick and the other team members here. These are the individuals that help City Council every day. They are very vital to the 16 great people that you see right here that's running your city, and they help them daily, weekends, evenings. My office is always there to assist them. And I do want to add something else that when you get up here, people always talk about their staff and their team. I want to say that this is my team, and you all don't get enough recognition. They recognize everybody else. Everybody always comes and hammers you all, but they don't give you what you need as far as recognition and appreciation. So I want to appreciate the council members as my team. Next slide, please. So today I am going to go over City Council's office breakdown, the alignment that they have, budget comparisons, the increases and decreases for FY27, Council's expenditures. I'm gonna do a small overview of the council district service fund. We're gonna do the budget programs, and then I'm gonna go into a detailed um spreadsheet for the council district service fund, and we're gonna do the priorities and initiatives. Next slide, please. So we have the city council's organizational chart, and for FY27, we have approximately 91.6 staffers that will be there. You can see the budget for this year is 16,965,724. That proposed budget consists of 16 council office, which you see in the organization chart. Each budget for the council office is six hundred and sixty-six thousand five hundred and ten dollars. We also have the health benefits on there and council district service funds. Next slide, please. The demographics for FY26, we had 53 females and 31 males. The ethnicity, we had 29 Hispanic Latinos, 26 white, 26 black African American, and three Asian Pacific Islanders. Next slide, please. The strategic alignment for city council, and as you know, I'm speaking as council as a whole. And the city council members, as I stated before, they are great individuals, all six of them. 16 of them worked work diligently to help the city with the mayor's priorities, which are infrastructure, quality of life, public safety, and government that works. And as you can see through the town halls and the workshops that the council members have throughout the year, that brings on the citizens' engagement and that helps them to reach this vision of victory that they're trying to accomplish with the city of Houston. Next slide, please. So I will give you a comparison of FY26 to FY27's budget. The adopted budget in FY26 was 19,246,137, and it is broken down as you can see on the side. 13,063,996 was the actual operating budget that we had, and it was $624,023 per office. There was also a budget amendment that was approved and added on for SWAT, which is the stormwater action team. Each council district office received 279,000 dollars and the health benefit was 6 to allocate to a project of their choosing. That gives you your adopted budget. Then presently, our current budget is 22,566,698. The adjustments were the restricted accounts, which are basically your IT accounts. Then we had a council district service fund carry forward of 3,323,451. To explain the carry forward, that are those are the council service budgets that are not completed within the fiscal year. All these projects are submitted and approved, but as you know, there are over 300 projects that they get, and a lot of times they're not able to finish them before the end of the fiscal year. Those projects and the funds are carried forward to the next fiscal year.

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