Metropolitan Council - Regular Meeting

Oh, am I on? Oh, yikes. I do this all the time. Is it on? Yes, it is.

I told you. Yes. I do this every year. Okay, let's click. Hello everyone. Um, this is Councilwoman Sofatara. I do this every year. Uh, where I'm not sure whether you can see me or not see me. I'm always again I try so hard um to do my it ahead of time, but this always happens. Anyway, um good afternoon and thank you all for anyone that has joined us so far. Uh this is the FY 2027 budget conversation. Um I hesitated a little bit this year whether I wanted to do this conversation or not uh because of there's so much going on in our world and um even here in Tennessee um that I thought people might not be interested uh in the budget conversation. Uh but I choose to to do it for a number of reason. Number one, um I got a couple of people that called me and said, well, they waiting for it. They're used to it. And the second reason, which is also critically important, is the fact that I made do made a promise uh in my campaign that I want to be transparent. Uh as government, there's a lack of trust in government because people don't understand what we're doing or they don't know what we're doing. Um, and so this is my way of making sure that uh I can explain in layman terms uh at least the biggest job that the council does uh which is the passing of the of the budget. And so uh we'll go ahead and share my screen and share um the slides with you. Um the slide that I'll be using today uh was put together actually by the uh finance department. So I'm very grateful to them for for doing that. And so I've adapted the

slide that they used to present to council. Um and that's what I'll be using to present to all of you this afternoon. So just made a couple of changes to it, but it's basically the same thing. Um let me know if you can hear me. Uh all right if there's any problem coming through please let me know. Also uh let me know if you can uh see the slide on the screen. I'm not able to look at my Facebook page because it's um always uh give sounds and feedback and so I'm checking now to see if you can see this screen um before I proceed. All right. All right. So, it's the 27 budget conversation. Um, and this is the schedule for this year. So, today we'll be looking at the mayor's budget as always, which is where we start. As all of you know, the budget season actually start with the mayor's uh presenting his uh budget to council. Uh, budget chair, uh, Tums has done a good job uh, interviewing our department heads. We have a couple of budget hearings and then we'll have budget workshops. uh she's also had some meetings across town and so uh this is just another step to that more information I don't think we can have too much information uh and so we will start this is an a bridge version it's not as long as I used to do it uh but I think this will get us to talk about the important stuff so today we'll be talking about the mayor's budget uh next week I'll be sitting down with uh the MNPS budget chair Dr. uh but McKenney to look at the uh MMPS budget in detail. Uh they will be presenting to council right before that. And so if you watch the budget presentation to council, if you have subsequent questions after that, then you're allowed and welcome uh to join us next Sunday as we take a deep dive into the MNS budget. Uh following that, we'll be looking at housing and

safety uh which are intertwined in so many ways. There's a lot uh done in housing in this budget. uh and so we can take some more look into uh what are we doing for our sin and safety uh as we go along. Uh as always we want the union leaders perspective uh uh and to hear what their members are saying what the people who wants uh on July 7 and finally on July 14 hopefully the chair's budget will be ready by then. If it's not we'll do something else but by July uh June 14th rather uh we will go ahead and sit down with budget chair tombs to look at our substitute budget. So for today uh basically I wanted to go over the 2027 budget with you in detail what did the what did the mayor propose uh and then I want to do a five-year comparison uh somebody had reached out to me I think it was Miss Vonda that said it would be nice to see yeartoyear what we've been doing and so I will go over uh since 2023 uh what did our budget look like and what is what are the main things that we've been able to look at and then we'll talk about the 2027 calendar and legislation the things that we're supposed to uh go through and sing and then finally uh I'll take your question and answer. Uh please note that you are uh you can send your comments and your questions as I go through that would be fine and I'll take them as I go so you don't have to wait till the end. Uh but if you choose to wait till the end that will be fine as well. So this is supposed to be interactive. I want to make sure the whole point of this conversation is to share with you what I know, what council knows so far. Um, and to be able to get your questions and your input. Uh, I've shared with you over the years that for me uh I've gone back and used this uh budget conversations to influence my wish list. So some of the things that you tell me on this conversation is what I take back uh when I'm asking for or making adjustment or asking for proposed adjustment to the budget. So let's go on

and and look at the mayor's recommended budget. The first part of the budget we want to look at is the revenue. Uh how much which you know in a balanced budget the revenue across the expenses. And so basically you're looking at at how much we we're going to spend, how much we're bringing in uh for this year's budget. The mayor's proposed budget for FY27 is a 3 bill849 million uh roughly almost uh 4 billion uh um total. Uh this is just the operating budget. There's some other pieces of the budget that we're not talking about in details here. But when you look at the operative operating budget, which are the ones that are supported mainly by tax, uh it's about 4 billion 3.85 It's five uh exact uh this is a little bit more than last year. Last year was 3.8. This one is a 3.85. So about 50 million uh difference between uh last year and this year. So when you talk about this budget, where did the money come from? We're about to spend 4 billion. How did we come up with that money waste? What are the sources of that income? As many of you know, we've done this many times. The biggest source of our income is the property taxes. Uh this year's um property tax makes up about 57% of the total income that we're spending. Now I will say that there's not a big uh collection or a big increase in property taxes from last year. The the increase was not that much and I'll talk talk about that in another slide. Um and the tax rate is flat is the same as last year. And so the difference that we're able to find in property taxes from last year to this year is not is not a whole lot. Uh and that's one of the reason why you will see that the budget is uh technically flat similar to last year in a lot of ways. Uh the second uh source of our income is the sales tax and we'll

talk about the um the decision in this budget that will impact that local sales option tax and so that forms about 20% of where we get our revenue from. uh other government agencies makes up about 12% and all other revenue um charges, bills, fees paid and things like that uh comes up to about 384 uh million. Now um we will talk about 49 million uh of our fund balance being used to balance this budget. uh when you add up all the sources of income for the four sources that we've talked about, uh the sum of all of these three comes to 3.8 billion. Uh and so, but since we're spending 3.85, uh in order to be able to make up that.5 or 50 million, uh that piece is coming from uh the from our fund balance. And so we'll talk about the fund balance. What is the impact of this 50 million on it? Uh in another section when we get to the fund balance okay but these are the sources. This is where Metro gets money to government. Uh the bulk of the money comes from taxes. Um okay. And so that is our sources of revenue for the year. So now when we go to our operating expenses like I said our income or revenue must match our expenses for the budget to be to be balanced. Um oh oh uh I was told that you're not able to see my slide. Uh oh I've been sharing that. Let's see. Okay. Sorry about that and thanks for letting me know sooner. Um not sure it's showing as uh being shared

on my end. All right. So my apologies for that. Uh again I do my best to be as technologically savvy as I can. Uh but sometimes it just doesn't work that way. So I hope you can you can see I hope you can see that slide. Uh, now I'm trying to make sure. All right, let's make sure. Again, my apologies for this technological stuff. It always always always gets me. So, uh, since I've already gone through it, I'll just make it to where, um, just go on ahead and and go through it as quickly as possible. And so, we already talk about the calendar. I will not go ahead and repeat that. Um, but that's the calendar for the year. U, this is the agenda of what we're talking about. Not repeating that. Um and so the biggest thing that I wanted to make sure that I it shows on the recording and on this slide uh is the uh revenue that we have uh and so um 3 point okay um I'm making sure that it's still showing uh 3.8 3.3 billion 3.85 85 billion uh is the total uh revenue for the year and then I just talk about where the money comes from uh which I hope you are able to continue to see. I'm using two screens and so sometimes when I uh toggle between them I lose some of the stuff so I want to make sure that uh you can still see uh it's okay. All right. Um and so that is um where

our money comes from. 57% from property taxes um 20% from sales tax 12% from other government and about 10% from other revenue and the sum of that makes up the 3 billion8 uh50 uh that we are spending for this uh fiscal year. Again, just checking to make sure that this is still showing. Uh, as a reminder, for those of you that are not able to watch or you don't see all of this, I always turn this into a blog uh and a newsletter and I'll be sending those out. So, we get uh participation online, but we also make sure that uh I send this out in written form. So, don't worry. Everything that I'm talking about here, you will be able to get in an email or be able to see um in my blog. So now we go to the operating expenses uh which I know is what a lot of you are are interested in. And so this is a slide that shows the comparison between 2026 which is the year that we're in and the 2027 uh proposed mayoral budget. Uh our general operating fund is going to be one almost 2 billion 1.95. Uh what goes to the school is 1.448. Uh that's the total amount that we are funding with the school and this is everything. This includes form balance restoration. Most of this number include form balance restoration. When we get to the slide on the school, you will see that. Um, and so you might be wondering why we'll talk about it when we get there. Why we're saying is 55 million extra to the school, but the difference between this one and that is not technically is because in this number you're looking at the fund balance restoration, uh, which is not direct money for operations that we gave them. So, but we will talk about that. And again, if anyone has any question, I'll be more than happy to to answer that. So, when you're looking at our operating funds, technically you're looking at the first three. That is what makes us makes

up that 3.8 billion that we're talking about, 3.85 billion that we're talking about, which is your general operating, your MMPS, and you're looking at your debt service. The other sources of um expenses that you're looking at is not taxfunded. uh these are special revenue. Uh internal services is when we build, one department builds another and then the enterprise funds are funds that basically collect money and support themselves like water, um the the fairground, uh the um municipal auditorium, convention center, all of those funds that collects their own money, pay their own bill, and so it's not from property taxes. But if you're looking at government as a whole whether it's through tax funded or other sources then you're looking at six billion uh in um in expenditure but the operating which is what a lot of people are interested in which is the general fund day-to-day running uh it will be the 3.85 uh billion and that's the force this first three numbers. So where does the money go uh of the 3.85 85 billion uh 50% almost 51% of that is the operating funds uh of the government metro government operating the department and all of that uh that is 51% of that um then the education our education is the biggest chunk when you're looking at the department in metro uh this year will be 1 billion 1.448 448 uh billion which almost 1.5 uh billion is what we'll be spending education and that's about 38% 38% of the funding and then the 12% that is left actually goes to our debt service um which is where we pay all of our bonds uh actually our bond service uh amount went down this year because of the good uh region that

we have and how finance has been able to to manage that debt service. Uh so I thought I would point that out to all of you as well. All right. So we talk about we have the revenue but the revenue was not enough to cover all of our expenses. And so to be able to cover the rest of the expenses, we will be using uh part of the fund balance to cover what we call uh one-time expenses. Uh things that we only do maybe one time to set up uh um and and we use that fund balance to to take care of it. Uh we will discuss later because we do have a fund balance policy that ensures that we're not double dipping not double dipping but over dipping into our fund balance. Many of us that were second timer remember what happened the first year on council where our fund balance was so low that the controller has to come in and so we don't want to do that anymore. And so we've been able to have a fund balance policy that requires a minimum in our fund balance. And so even though we're dipping into it this time, it does not negatively impact that that um balance or threshold that we set. And so we'll talk about that a little bit. But these are some of the things that will be funded one time using fund balance. Uh the biggest of it is the adjustment to metro employee adjustment. Uh you're also looking at our injury and duty IOD for pensioners and current employees. uh the 7 million that we'll be using for the um housing revolving loan which we'll talk about in another section uh is also coming out of this uh one-time funding. Again uh I'll be sharing all of this and you can always come back and take a look at the slide later. If you have any question uh please feel free to put it in the chat or if you have any comment I welcome them as well. So when we talk about um

where we're spending the money, this is a a a chart that shows us uh the expenditure by category. And so when you look at it, the general government is 10%. Uh you can see that our debt service is about 11%. The school, which is the biggest chunk like I mentioned earlier, uh is 38%. Uh other very high um category would be your law enforcement. Law enforcement and care of prisoners which is uh MNPD and the sheriff department it's about 13%. Uh the fire department uh is about 6%. And so this is infrastructure and transportation 6%. And so our health and hospitals is about 5%. So when you're looking at which department, what area, if you want to break it up by category, where are we spending that money? Uh we look at the big bucket of federal government, uh metro government and then we look at schools and we look at debt service. But now if you want to look at all of it, break down into category, uh this is an important slide that shows exactly um what we're doing with that money. There's a lot of conversation in this space about what we should be doing and what we need to be reducing, what we need to be spending more on. Uh I'm with the thought process that believe that we need to do a whole lot more in health. Uh our infrastructure needs some more funding. Uh there's a whole lot of places we need to go but um just just um we'll talk about those in subsequent uh conversations. So what are the key highlights for this year? every year the the budget even though this is this is flat and there's only 50 million between last year and this year uh the mayor uh took the time to actually uh highlight and put some

more money in some areas. So what are those key highlights uh in this year's budget that I believe people will be interested in? Uh the first one is the s the reduction of the grocery tax. Uh you've heard about that. So in this year's budget, the mayor is proposing a half penny reduction in uh grocery tax. Uh our grocery tax or our sales tax for on gross rates about 9.25% with 7% going to the state. 2.25 is a metro's part of it. And so that 2.25 will be reduced to 1.75. And so what does that mean? It means that there's going to be about according to finance it will be about 11 million uh almost 12 million reduction in in uh in our sales tax revenue. Uh when you look at 12 months uh but because this budget is not using it I think the 10 months that has been calculated to date is 9.2 but for the 12 months uh that we're looking at is going to be almost 12 million. So uh we always get the sales tax revenue uh from the state it go it takes about 2 months lag and so that's why in the FY 2027 you only looking at 10 months collection uh uh on that and that's why it's projected at 9.2 9.2 2 million uh property tax like I said for FY27 only represented about only uh 17 14.7 million which is only less than not not a lot less than 1% uh increase from last year. Uh and so wanted to point that out as well. Every budget always have to do something for the employees. uh it's very important that we take care of the people that are taking care of our city, the people that are making our city grow. And so every year we want to make sure that we're taking care of them.

This budget is no exception. And so this budget includes the 36.8 million um change to employee packages, employee salaries. Uh part of that is represented as a 1.7% across the board uh increase. And then you have a 2% merit eligibility in steps. So you will have some people have about when you add them together about 3.7% increase uh to their salary. Now Metro has been very good over the years uh even though the state minimum wage is 7.25 which has not changed God in ages. Um Metro has been a leader in trying to uh bridge that gap and make sure that Metro employees are paid. you know, uh it's not believable wage because there it takes a lot to live in Nashville. Uh and there's a push to do more. Uh but I applaud the mayor uh for at least moving Metro along and making sure that Metro employees are way above uh most industries in the market in terms of the minimum wage. And so this year uh the minimum uh wage for Metro employee coming in is at 2250 an hour. Um that's that's a big jump from the 725. Uh we've steadily increased this over the years. I remember when he was 18 and then it became 20 and so uh steadily continued to grow hopefully as a way to help our employees to be able to to live in the city. Um housing is a big part. We cannot talk about Nashville growth. Uh we have a lot of uh issue with homelessness. We don't have enough uh housing. Uh I serve on the mayor's housing task force many years back. Uh was also housing is something that I'm very passionate about. And so I'm always very interested in making sure that uh we're doing all

that we can um for housing. And so the mayor's budget includes an additional 6 million investment in the bonds fund. Uh it was 60 million last year and so this year is now 22 million. Um I believe it should be 30 uh maybe because I was on the task force and I do believe that every money that we put into the bonds is money that developer can leverage uh to get more money to build more housing. We have to have housing. I whether it's homelessness or anything else we're talking about housing is going to be the ultimate um solution. And so do we have more housing? I think it's a conversation that uh we have to continue to have. So I'm glad that we have the 22 million which is 30 million um but there is 22 million and um grateful for that. Uh a new funding in this budget relating to housing is a 7 million revolving loan. Uh this is a loan unlike grants uh um unlike grants program. This is a loan which means that if a developer is building affordable housing and they need money to make up or to be able to finish and they're not able to uh get as much as they need, they can borrow from this loan fund. Uh they they they borrow from it and they pay you back. That's why it's revolving. And so when they pay back, somebody else can have it with the hope that uh funding would not be a detriment or would not be uh something that stops our developers uh from from developing affordable housing. Uh the pilots program continues for housing with uh 5 million in LITC. uh there's a mixed income 2 million and then for permanent supporting housing pilot uh we have a 1 million um in the pilot program for a total of 8 million. Again different tools in the toolbox to be able to help us um have more affordable housing. Other highlights in this budget, uh, as

many of you know, there were a lot of things that were funded, uh, by the APA funds, uh, the COVID funds that we got from the federal government that allow us to be able to fund a lot of things in that period. uh that grant is ended uh uh uh ended December uh this past December I believe or this year I can't remember but the the grant is ending and so we do not have that money to spend anymore and so after this fiscal last fiscal year roll into this fiscal year by December um that money was gone and so how do we make sure that the things that are being funded the things that um those APA funds were funding that we did not lose them because they were services that were provided to our citizens. Uh and while those app funds were good and they help um it was important for us as a government to continue to make sure that uh those services are not lost. And so some of those the biggest part of it is the office of homeless services uh which is getting an additional 5 million in this budget uh to be able to do in housing is part of it case management 2 million and then they have u staffing uh to administer some of the programs that they're doing. Uh one of the question that I had asked during budget airing is uh the the homeless services does not provide these services. This is the non forprofit and the organization that does uh but according to the office of homelessness there are some gap uh that exist and so this staffing allows them to uh fill those gap and to make sure that people are directed or connected to the services that will be able to help them. Uh office of family safety uh is also receiving money that uh from co we're losing from a funds and we want a continuation. Uh this third one is one that everybody knows that I'm very biased about. I'm very passionate about. This is the eviction right to council.

I'm so grateful that we had funding during h funds to uh to start the program. And when you look at the stout report, it shows that for every dollar that Metro spends to keep people from losing their homes, it's like a savings of $4 at the end of the day because when people are out, then you don't have to spend money on uh homelessness on on medical bills, hospitals. I mean, it's just a whole lot. And so, and I believe and a lot of us believe that, you know, just as much as it's important for us to build new homes, it's also critical that we help people stay in the home that they got. And so, this eviction right to council program is one that is um very important that is working very well. I'm grateful to the mayor, uh to the planning department, uh to the housing division, the uh uh planning department, to the ERTC coalition, and everybody especially the GUI and Hispanic B and all the partners um uh that are helping to make this program work. So, I'm grateful that the funding continues. Uh the 2.4 million is what we got last year. I was hoping we'll get more uh because for all that is doing I'm hoping that we could put more in it but for now we're grateful for what we got. Uh the tuck uh um had some hyper funds and then Jon has some ha fund that uh is also continuing in this budget. uh they gain more things uh the sheriff's office care of prisoner um 8.5 million correctional health care 10 million general hospital got 7 million uh the juna court um you remember that we're building a new center that is uh I love the vision with uh just about uh making sure that we do a whole lot for the children and make sure that it's not just about uh jailing and and stuff and so it's a wraparound it's a multi campus

it's have a lot of things and that is looking to open uh in late 2027 and so additional 4.2 million for that. Uh the assessor of property got a 1.4 million because we're looking to move into two-year appraisal circle. Uh and so that's what that is doing. The tax relief program uh this is something that is very crucial for our elderly um uh residents um that as uh taxes is going up that we're able to provide some relief for them. uh the mentor co-op uh one of the best program that I've seen um that helps make sure that we're not using police for somebody that has mental health issue. You know our jails full of people that you know don't need to be in jail uh but need help to be another facility. Allow us to be able to have mental health individuals uh go on right when there's a call and assess the need. And so this is one that we're funding and very grateful for. Same thing for the uh strong babies. I think these are very good things and good for the mayor for including all of this in his recommended budget. Um we cannot talk about the departments and their budget without also mentioning that just like last year uh this year to the department are asked to take a look at their overall budget and look at where there could be reductions. We wanted to make sure that you know if there's anything that could be trimmed that the department are looking into that without um geopodizing services uh to our to our residents. And so this budget includes a recommendation for the department to build in a 1.5% reduction uh into their taxes which come to about 20.6 million according to the finance department. the uh finance department will be um working with the department throughout the year to be able to uh look at what needs to be done and and making sure that the reduction does not um impact uh impact

their performance. All right, that is the um operating fund that is metro government uh which is uh about 50% of the of the budget and now the other part which is the 38% which is the metro school uh budget. So this year we are funding the MNS budget as 1.438 uh billion. Um this is where we're looking at that difference without looking at uh fund balance restoration. Just looking at the amount that was given for operation, you're looking at uh 1.382 trillion um in 26 and then this year we're looking at 1.438 um trillion in the school school budget. And the difference between this is the 55 million extra uh that we're putting into into Metro School. Uh we will have a conversation with the MNPS budget chair next week where we'll take a deep deeper dive into the metro school fund budget metro MNS budget what's in it uh what's the details look at the funding from the states I look at their performance you have the opportunity to ask them questions and all of that but as a general uh overview um this is uh this is the budget for the school year proposed by the mayor um for for um the school board and I also wanted to make anyway we'll talk about this when we talk about school next year. All right. So 55 million is the increase uh for the budget to to MNS. Uh this represents a 4% uh increase uh from uh from last year uh to the MNS budget. Again, we will be looking at um this in detail next week. And this 55 million does not includes

the fund balance restoration uh in in the MPS budget. Again, we'll look at that uh in detail again next week as well. So, at this point, we wanted to talk about our fund balance because a balanced budget is very critical. Uh and so, I remember in the beginning, I talked about how we're using 50 million to balance this year's budget that we have a 3.8 8 trillion revenue but our expenditure is 3.85. So that.5 uh came up the 50 million comes from our fund balancing. So wanted to take a minute to talk about that. Um as you all may remember we passed a resolution making sure that our fund balance does not get below a certain percentage. So for our operating reserve uh that is 17%. For our debt service we wanted to make sure that it's no less than 50%. That's a threshold. And in order to uh help us to do that, we also set up last year for the first time what we call the budget sustainability reserve. Uh the budget sustainability reserve is a target of 1 to 6% and that is determined by the um director of finance after looking at everything else. Uh so this is where we are for after the 2027 recommended budget. As you can see that the projected uh threshold or the reserve is met on all of our funds. So from uh the general fund that's the 17 remember debt services 50%. So the school fund will be at the 14 17 and the schoolboard debt services also be at 50%. same for the GST and the USD. And so after the use of the fund, the 48 million, I was still able to make sure that we did not go below our um threshold or our reserve uh for each fund. This is the uh sustainability. Remember it's between 1 and 6%. uh this is not

set by council or the behavior set by this director of uh uh the director of finance and so based on the recommendation for 27 uh we have a 2% across the board sustainability the GST rate and then 4% for the USD rate and so I wanted to go through this really quickly was a request uh by constituent to look at uh year to year every year we come in here we talk about the budget for the year and we look in detail just like we just stated a deep dive. Uh but someone had asked me if I would take a look at the last three years is what she'd asked for and thanks to finance I want to thank uh the finance team for putting this together for me as well. Uh this is a 5-year comparison from 2023 to 2027. And so when you look at our income, our revenue uh um for for the last five years uh you can see that it steadily continues to in all areas uh honestly uh continues to to to go up. Um, you would notice and I think that you may notice that the USD went down considerably from 25 and that was because of the study that we did. If uh those anyone that remembers last year that shows that there were a lot of services that were being charged um in the in the uh uh USD that should be in the GSD. And so we made a whole lot of difference and and change all of that. That's why you see uh a whole lot of things go down in that area I believe. Uh but overall um the budget the the the overall budget for last year in the GST again is pretty much flat uh only about 1 million

difference. Uh this is MMPD. Again these numbers includes the uh fund balance restoration and so uh which is in this case with the form balance restoration made that only about 35 million I'm looking at um and so but you can see that for a growing city um national population continues to grow and as a result all of this um all of these expenses continue to to grow um except for this one that took a deep dive again is because of the study that says that there were several things that were been charged to USD but it shouldn't be just USD only that it should have been prorated or shared with the GSD. Uh part of that was fire department. Um and so the the take is that fire department goes everywhere and so uh there's still a lot of conversation happening about this the the study and the impact. uh but that's why you saw that that's that's what accounts for the reduction between F25 and F26 otherwise every other uh revenue category and expense category continues to go up to account for the need of a growing city. On the expenditures uh side I did the same thing and went ahead and look at our expenditure for the top 25 uh division or or or or spending uh categories on the budget. And so these are the top one. When you look at the administrative, now I want to make sure that administrative has a lot of things in it. This is where we account for uh employee benefits. This is where we account for our insurance. uh uh the um contingencies uh uh uh uh uh self employee

self-insured insurance and things like that goes in here. This is also where we account for um money that is given to communities. Uh the money for general hospital goes in there as well. And so when you're looking at administrative, that's what you that's what you're taking a look at. um fairground, the farmers market. Um and so that's that's what you're looking at in this case. You're looking at general administrative Oh, not not fair ground rather, but the bonds fund. The bonds fund is in this administrative uh uh um department. So it's bans funds, general hospital uh is the um employee benefits that we talk about. All of that is lumping to administration. Uh and then the top 15 and I use the uh top 25 uh based on the highest amount for FY27. I sorted the spreadsheet out using FY27 and just took the top top top 25. Uh and so that's what you're looking at. And so for those departments uh of course our police is the highest followed by our fire department followed by our sheriff and then the parks goes next and you can look at all of this as everybody uh technically just increasing uh uh year to year as we as we continue to grow. Um so for those that are interested and have additional question uh this slide is available for you and you can take a look at it. Uh and for the one that requested for it, this is what finances sent to me. Now I will say for the police and the fire department, uh this is the budget that the um finance department sent to me the FY26 number. It's different from what I have

from the ordinance. Um with my computation on the ordinance, it appears as if there's an increase. So I'm still talking to finance to see why this is a number that they have. Uh but until I get the answer from them, at least it shows that it's flat. Uh but if you look at the FY26 ordinance and you look at FY27 ordinance, there is about a 50 million difference in uh MPD and uh uh I think about 10 million also in uh in fire. So uh this is something that I will follow up on when we have a subsequent conversation on on law enforcement and safety and housing. uh hopefully I'll have my response by that time. So again this spread this number cames from finance um and so I'm just using it as is presented but I do have question about the FY26 number uh for some of this department. All right. Um again I'm checking to see if there's any question. um the calendar as it is uh um for this year the um mayor's presented his budget that's already happened and then the council budget um budget and finance committee is holding holding committee hearings that's already going on chair chums is uh having that uh right now with departmental eds just to be able to ask more question and have a better understanding and then this is the date that I want to make sure that you all pay close attention to this is the public hearing. Uh it will be the second reading of the ordinance. But this is where the committee can come in and and and let us know um what your thoughts are about this budget. This hearing has been very crucial in the past. I can tell you that uh many of you uh will remember when uh the SMC I believe uh came in and the students talk about um safety in this town talk about the importance of security for children uh during chair porterfield time and

because of that chair pterfield was able to uh work with the administration and work with the juvenile court work with SMC uh to come up and now we have office of youth safety and so these these sessions are very critical. I remember last year too after pull and um conversation and recommendation from the people's budget coalition uh about again safety we were able to uh put a million dollars in the community safety fund. uh out of that came the group that is now working on uh community safety plan uh put together by the mayor about 29 people I believe and so your feedback is very critical your your opinion on what we need to do we should do them I think it's very important um now it is a mayoral budget uh I will put the cab that council is unable to do a whole lot honestly uh in terms of what we can move or what we can change in my experience it's been very little but every little bit helps and whenever we can do something uh obviously this council wants to make sure and chums wants to make sure that we do it uh and I always recommend everybody don't wait until the budget is out if there's anything special that you want or should be funded make sure you're communicating with the mayor's office if it's a mayor budget the biggest chunk of this is decided by the mayor's office I cannot say that enough uh but within the little power that the council has within the minimum that we can uh we've been able to uh make some budget changes uh the rich program uh uh uh interpretation services uh so we've been able to do to do things uh in the past advocacy centers I remember uh the first year that we had the budget and uh MNS was only going to do six and the question was why are we not doing every schools and so with that I was able to propose an amendment supported by colleagues

um that shows that we need advocacy schools in all elementary schools and we've been able to do that. So this process does work and so please come on the second and let us know your thoughts. Uh I'm sure you can email your council person, you can email the budget chair, you can email me, I will be more than happy to hear from you. Uh June 16 is when we're proposing to have the third and final reading. And for those of you that uh knows how the process work, uh we have until June 30 to pass a council budget. If the chair has a substitute budget and in all my time in council, uh this is my second time. There's always been a substitute budget every year because there's always something the the council wants to do differently. And so if we're able to, we have until June 30th to pass substitute budget if we so choose. If we do not agree or not able to pass on then by charter the mayor's budget just as is presented right now uh goes into effect um by June 30th. Uh these are some legislation that you should keep track of. Uh the budget ordinance uh is uh we'll be tracking against the second reading will be on June 2nd and we hope you'll come and uh voice your opinion. Uh obviously we do the tax level uh legislation as le legislation. Uh the rate is going to remain the same. We're not changing the rate obviously. Uh but we have to pass the the the uh ordinance for that. Uh there will be the pay play plan resolution to adopt the uh pay plan for metro employees and then the new grocery tax resolution reducing that gross tax rate uh from 2.25 to 1.75. Uh we also will be considering the capital improvements budget uh along with this and then we always also have the 4% fund which typically funds our um fixed let's

put it like that uh typically funds our fixed uh um items or that are not um in the uh CI. It's more like small items um but not Yeah, I think it's it's more like funding funding. funds a lot of different things, but they're not operating in nature and they're not uh big item capital items. And so, so you see things like um things for general services uh the the the me software and little little things like that comes from the 4% reserve fund. Um and then uh if there's any supplementary resolution that needs to be passed for this year before this year's end, uh then we'll do that as well. So those are the things to keep track of. All of this legislation again you can find online um on the metro website on the citizens uh budget guide. All right. At this point uh I've talked a lot. I don't know uh if we have anyone online or not. Uh sometimes uh we don't get a lot of people online. I get subsequent questions later or um people engage a lot more through the blog and through the newsletter and that's fine. But this uh is being recorded and this is going to leave on on the on Facebook. Uh and so if you miss the live presentation, you can always uh send me questions later. Um so at this point I want to check if there's any comment or question. Uh there's a lot that I've thrown at you. Uh but if there's any comments or question, I'll be more than happy to take that now.

I'm checking to see if there's anything on Facebook on my phone. Um, as I am not able to um see everything as I go and I'm making sure that the volume is up. So, my apologies uh uh if I'm looking at my phone, but that's what I'm trying to do to make sure to see if there was any any um anything showing here. Right now, I don't see any. See, am I in the right page? Oh, not in the right page. Okay, I see some comments. Okay. All right. Thank you to those of you that joined. Um, I appreciate it. I see I see your comments. Um, I appreciate that. It's uh it took me a minute to get going, but I but I'm glad we got it. And again, um, if you have any question, um, let me know or comments. I'll be more than happy to take that. So, I'll give it a I'm looking right now to see if there's anything I don't see. I see your comments that you're on that you see it. Thank you, Renee. Uh, you're always joining every time that I do this. Uh, thanks for always being engaged. Um, I see, uh, Timothy, thank you so much. uh the president of NWACP. Thank you so much for for for joining and and for your leadership. Um I appreciate all of you. Appreciate all of you. All right. It does not look as if there's any question at this time or comments uh other than you can see me, you're there. I'm glad. Um all right. So again, thank you all so

much. Uh sorry for the the little technological issue at the beginning. Um I I'll be sure to to uh remove that uh by next time. Uh next week uh we will be talking to MMPS budget chair uh Dr. Nama McKini about the MNS budget. Um and we'll take a deep dive at uh into that one uh next week. I hope you take the time to join me. I change all of this to Sundays. Part of it is because Saturday was a little bit difficult for many people. Uh there's games and children stuff and so many things happening that uh it's very difficult getting folks on Saturday. So that's why I change it to Sundays. Uh trying it out. I hope Sunday works. Excuse me. I hope Sunday works for for folks. Um but uh it will be recorded. It will be here and I'm always always available uh for your questions and your answers. So if there are no questions uh before I um close it out, I want to use this opportunity to inform and to invite you all uh to the uh annual John Lewis way march. Uh this march will be on July 18th. Uh uh it will start at um the Tennessee Archives and Museum on Jefferson and John Lewis and we'll be marching all the way to to the Ryman Auditorium. Uh we'll be sharing the flyer there some things that need to correct in this. Um but I wanted to make sure that I put this for you in light of what is gone down the past couple of weeks. Uh the Supreme Court's attack on the voting rights acts uh what's gone down in the state of Tennessee and across the states across the south uh with the um redistricting uh that have diluted black voices. Uh I want to thank all the people that are

organizing in this space. Uh Equity Alliance Talk, Civic Tennessee, Memphis for all. Uh so many organization that have stepped up uh to to bring attention to this. Uh many people were on the road to Alabama yesterday uh calling on all of us to stand up and do what we need to do. So uh there's a whole lot that we have to do. Uh uh and so this is one more way to to act and to stand up. John Lewis spent his life uh uh working for fighting for the Voting Rights Act. Um uh and so rather than even passing the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, uh we're now going backward to what we already have uh uh and making sure that it doesn't even do much anymore with with the Supreme Court guarding it. It's very sad. Uh but we all have something to do. Uh we all can can can do something. And so we're inviting you to join us on July 18. There's so many actions going on uh uh from now until then and much more later. Uh please make sure you're supporting. Make sure you're doing your part. Um and so I wanted to put this out to you. Um and more than anything, please do go out and vote. This is not the time to think that our vote doesn't count. This is not the time to sit it out. This is not the time to say they're going to do what they want anyway. Please, please, please, please, for the sake of the people that fought so hard for all of us to be here, for the sake of the people that put their body and their lives on the line uh for democracy, for justice, for equal access for all of us. We owe it to ourselves. We owe it to them and we owe it to the generation after us to make sure that we continue to stand up and fight for our democracy. Again, I hope you will consider joining us on July 18. um encouraging all of you to join any other actions that are ongoing um in terms of supporting the voting

rights act uh and more and more and more and more than anything else please please vote please vote if you can run for office please run we need good people to run uh support people that are running encourage people to run and go vote vote they cannot take it unless we give it at least our voices at the ballot boxes so Um all righty. Uh again, thank you all so much. Um I will see you next week on day 20 I believe uh next Sunday also at 3:00 p.m. when we'll be taking a look at the school board uh budget. Um thank you. I appreciate every single one of you. Thank you for tuning in. Thank you for your support. And please let's continue to speak up not just for the state, the federal, but also locally. Uh get in touch with your council members. If you have any issues with the budget, let us know. If you have any issues about Nashville, let us know. Get in touch, you know, just keep us honest and continue to encourage, inspire, and push us. And uh I appreciate all of you again. Um thank you all so much. And I hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend and that you have a wonderful uh week starting Monday. All right. Actually, new week start today. Started today. So, have a wonderful week. Thank you. Bye-bye.