The Finance Committee of Lakewood City Council met on March 20, 2026, chaired by Kyle Baker. The committee considered two ordinances: one to establish a Host Community Cannabis Fund (Ordinance 15-2026) and one to restructure the Audit Committee (Ordinance 27-2025). Both items were discussed am ended and recommended favorably to full Council.
I will go ahead and call to order March 23rd, 2026 Finance Committee. The first order of business is the review and approval of the March 2nd, 2026 Finance Committee meeting minutes. Without objection, they are approved. I was ready to make my big motion. Well, I stole your thunder, Councilman Bullock, I apologize. The next order of business, we have two docket items of which we covered uh in our last meeting, uh, but we wanted to sleep on it a little bit uh before we came back. So the first uh one is ordinance 15 2026, uh which is the ordinance to create uh the host community cannabis fund uh section 12965 of like codified ordinances. Uh as introduced, it had some language and then on the floor at the last meeting we discussed some additional language uh that I I believe is reflected in Granicus as a substitute. Um there may be further amendments on that. Uh but I I guess to start the discussion off, I will move to substitute the ordinance with um the substitute that is in Granicus. Second. Um the motion is made second discussion. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Um, so now we have um the substituted version. Uh the one thing uh so Councilman Evans couldn't be here, uh, but he did send me a thoughtful note in advance. I think he's dealing with allergies or uh is a little under the weather, is sometimes um you know I I as a member of council I have a good idea of of of the purpose of our funds, where the money that goes into our funds come from and the general purpose that those monies are then spent uh because it's dictated in our codified ordinances and in law. The one thing is I don't always have great clarity, and perhaps um if you go through the budget book you could find that clarity of like what specific things the funds from a specific fund are spent on. I should stop saying fund. What specific things the money from the funds are spent on from a line item perspective? And that's one thing that Councilman Evans brought up. And I was wondering if there is an easy way. So this a question to the finance director is uh would there be a way over the next couple of years for the finance department to provide a communication to the docket at the end of each year that kind of outlines what where this money was spent in a more limited nature and not like kind of segregated from the other funds? Are you meaning specific to this? To this fund, yes. Well, it would the definition would be in our CAFER, uh AFCR, sorry. Um, so for the uninitiated, could you describe what an AFR is? It's our our yearly financials, and there is a list, I believe there should be a list of every fund and what their purpose is in that um. And I mean, yeah, I'm I'm happy to give a report uh to counsel on the specific fund if you if you wanted um annually. Yes, because I I understand, and and that's my level of knowledge of our funds. We have many restricted funds, and I read through and I see balances. And then sometimes when I go into the Board of Control, I can see where money comes from for certain projects. Um but then the collation is where I miss some of it to see actually where you know, like kind of a true up of the of a particular fund. And I think this one is of importance to the community. It's a new revenue source, so I think some mechanism to see that from a reporting standpoint. What whatever we do to the language and exhibit or in uh subsection C as far as what the authorized expenditures are. Any comments from my colleagues on on that point? Councilman Bullock? Thanks. You're saying not a prospective but a year-end or uh look back uh reporting period to say what what were the actuals? Yes, and and and why I propose that is because this is a new new source of funds. So I think it would be helpful for us as the appropriators in the city to see where these new funds are going. And then potentially that could inform some future decisions about authorized expenditures, right? Are we is there money sitting in there because it can't be spent, or is do it do we see it's going more towards a certain uh subsection of the authorized expenditure, so we want to think about that from a policy perspective? Certainly. I mean that's that's I agree very much, and I think that probably is a healthy practice for all funds for a browser now. Um but to take this first step, I'd be happy to support a request or a um a requirement. I suppose, Director, would a simple communication um be enough? Um that this could be a standard practice for at least this fund. Sure.