I'd like to call uh order uh uh to the regular meeting of the city council public finance authority.

Uh clerk, please call the roll.

Councilmember Kalmick here.

Councilmember Mosier.

Here.

Mayor Pro Tem Vandermark.

Here.

Mayor Strickland.

Here.

Councilmember McKeon.

Here.

Councilmember Bolton.

Here.

Councilmember Burns.

Here.

All present.

Thank you.

Uh now, members going down to the agenda.

We have uh council comments.

Is any councilman have a comment?

I would.

Mr.

Councilman McKinnon.

Thank you.

Yeah, I just want to thank the community for their patience while we work through the critical budget process.

I've seen some comments in the community that we, the new elected council members are responsible for the the forecasted budget deficits in the coming years.

And nothing could be further from the truth.

We have been on the job six months and are not responsible for the actions of the previous city councils and previous city managers' decisions that have led us to this point.

They went on a three-year taxpayer spending spree.

They created a bloated and unnecessary homelessness administration and public health department.

That is the responsibility of the county.

They allowed the Elon and Breakwater properties to be purchased for quote workforce housing, whereby the city foregoes five hundred thousand dollars per year in property tax for the next thirty years, big pay increases during COVID, etc.

The only reason they showed a surplus was the one-time COVID funds, which are now gone.

Our budget is structurally balanced this year for fiscal year 2324, but the actions of the past councils have left us with an untenable financial situation in the coming budget years beyond 2324.

You hear the analogy all the time on the federal level about kicking the can down the road.

Well, we are at the end of the road.

It was also important that we gave our police department the tools they need to be able to recruit officers to fill our 30 police officer vacancies.

The national sentiment that has been created of defund the police and vilifying police officers has created an arms race with other cities that have been given large pay raises in order to recruit a diminishing talent pool of police officers.

Public safety is the number one role of government.

Everything flows off of having strong public safety.

It allows our businesses to be successful and our citizens to be safe, which creates prosperity and a high quality of life.

We need to run this city like a business where we maximize and harness our assets to increase revenue and trim our expenses where we can to cut wasteful spending.

We directed the department heads, as they know best, to come up with options to create revenues and trim expenses, which is what you see in the budget balancing plan.

Not every option will be implemented, but it was important to understand all of the options that are available.

We appreciate everyone's patience, and please know that this will be an ongoing continual process where we seek to find efficiencies every day moving forward so that we can make adjustments throughout the year by being fluent and flexible with course corrections if determined to be beneficial.

And lastly, Mayor, I just want to apologize to the community on behalf of the city council.

As for the second week in a row, our colleague, Councilmember Calmick, has sent out a campaign email filled with lies, smears, misrepresentations, and miserable.

Again, um everybody you all have three minutes to speak, and we'll be very respectful to each and every one of you on that three minutes.

Uh please be just as respectful to each and every event whether you agree or disagree, be respectful to all the council members in their comments, please.

Thank you.

Email filled with lies, smears, misrepet misrepresentations, and misinformation that has fomented division, confusion, and anxiety in the community.

I'd like to read a few lines from an email I sent out this week to the community.

Quote Last week I emailed you about an item coming to city council to ban books in our public libraries.

This is a lie.

Everyone understands that we are not banning books.

We directed the city manager to come back in September with options to establish guardrails to protect minors from illegally obscene and pornographic materials without parental consent in the public library that is paid for by all taxpayers.

He goes on further quote Now we're asking you to attend Monday special council meeting.

Substantial cuts in services are being proposed by this new council majority, including closing three branch libraries, cutting back hours at others, cutting back maintenance of trees and parks, cutting park rangers and city security services and much more.

Instead of working to solve these problems of the next year, this new council majority has rushed the cuts in the last two weeks of the budget process.

Again, more lies and misrepresentations.