Board of Aldermen - Regular Meeting

The board will now come to order. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Alderman Schweitzer.

Alderman Odenberg.

Here.

Alderman Cohn. Alderman Narayan. Alderman Devotee. Alderman Velazquez. Alderman Saunier. Alderwoman Cox-Antwi?

Here.

Alderman Browning? Here. Alderwoman Clark-Hubbard? Here. Alderwoman Keyes?

Here.

Alderwoman Tynes?

Present.

Alderwoman Boyd? Alderman Aldrich? Present. President Green? Present. Alderman Cohn. Alderwoman Boyd. We have 13 present.

According being present, we will dispense with line items three and four. Are there any introduction of honored guests? Any introduction of honored guests? Seeing none, we can dispense with line item five and six, report of city officials. We have none. We can dispense with line item seven. Okay. 8, 9, 10, 11. First reading of board bills. We have none. Condispense with line item 12. Reference to committee of board bills. We have none. Condispense with line item 13. Second reading report of standing committees.

The following board bill was reported out of budget and public employees committed with a due pass recommendation. for bill one as amended income committee sponsored by president green and alderman aldrich an ordinance making appropriation for payment of interest expenses and principle of the city's bonded fund indebtedness establishing city tax rate and making appropriation for current year expenses of the city government for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2026 and ending July 30, 2027, amounting in the aggregate to sum of $1,415,518,852, which sum is hereby appropriated for revenue and special funds named for the purposes hereunto enumerated and containing an emergency clause.

Alderman, from the 14th, you are recognized on the motion to suspend the rules for the purposes of moving Board Bill 1 as amended in committee to the regular perfection calendar.

Thank you, Madam President, members of the board. I'd like to make a motion that we suspend Board Bill 1 as amended to the perfection regular calendar.

It's been moved by the alderman from the 14th, seconded by the alderman from the 7th, that we suspend the rules for the purposes of moving Board Bill 1 as amended in committee to the regular perfection calendar. This is a non-debatable motion. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Alderman Weiser.

Alderman Odenberg.

Aye. Aye.

Alderman Cohn. Alderman Narayan. Aye. Alderman Devotee. Aye. Alderwoman Velazquez. Aye. Alderwoman Sonia.

Aye.

Alderwoman Cox-Santui. Aye. Alderman Browning. Aye. Alderwoman Carr-Cubbard.

Aye.

Alderwoman Keyes. Aye. I didn't hear you. Aye. Aye. Alderwoman Tice. Aye. Alderwoman Boyd. Aye. Alderman Aldridge.

Aye.

President Green. Aye.

Alderman Cohn.

Aye. Alderman Browning.

We have 14 aye votes. Alderwoman Boyd, if you could please mute yourself. Thank you. All right, I think we got it. By your vote, you sustain the motion from the Alderwoman from the 14th. Madam Clerk, if you could please place Board Bill 1 as amended in Committee on the Regular Perfection Calendar. So noted. Report of special committees. We have none. Dispense with line items 15. Board bills for perfection consent. We have none. We can dispense with line items 16. Board bills for perfection.

Board bill 1 as amended in committee sponsored by President Green and Alderman Aldridge. An ordinance making appropriation for payment of interest, expenses, and principal of the city's bonded indebtedness Establishing city tax rates and making appropriation for current year expenses of the city government for the fiscal year beginning July 1st, 2026 and ending July 30th, 2027 amounted in the aggregate to the sum of $1,414,518,852, which sum is hereby appropriated from revenue and special funds named for the purpose hereafter enumerated and containing an emergency clause.

Alderman from the 14th, you are recognized on the perfection of Board Bill 1 as amended in committee.

Thank you, Madam President, members of the board. I move that we perfect Board Bill 1 as amended in committee.

It's been moved by the alderman from the 14th, seconded by the alderman from the 7th, that we perfect Board Bill 1 as amended in committee. Alderman, you may proceed.

Thank you, Madam President, members of the board. Board Bill 1 as amended in committee is our annual operating budget. which makes up roughly $1 billion in the city of St. Louis. It's a typical budget that this board has passed on a regular basis. I do want to talk about there was some changes that the budget committee made as well as ENA. And the reason that we're having this special meeting is because there was a request from the police board on additional raises that we had to account for. But before I get to that, because I know that will be a discussion that some alders want to speak on, I just want to talk about some of the changes that we made in the budget committee. I do want to thank each budget member from the month of May to June. The budget committee has been meeting every single day. I do want to thank Vice Chair Browning, Alderman Devotee, Alderman Velazquez, and Alderman Sanye for meeting on a regular to hear from various departments on the budget. And one of the key things that's always important with this budget is that we also take these meetings out to the public. So we was able to have... Four opportunities for the public to weigh in. Our very first meeting was an open testimony meeting. Then we had, the following weekend, a meeting at Herbert Hoover Boys and Girls Club to hear from the community on the budget in the elevated 11th ward. And then from there, we had a meeting at the International Institute in the 7th ward to hear from residents. And before we voted out the budget, we also heard from residents to get their input on it. But a couple of the changes that we made from the budget committee that I want to speak on is, one, so the budget committee sent several recommendations over to ENA to take up those changes. And some of the changes that was taken up from ENA was we added some positions in the forestry department. We added two urban forestry positions in that department. We also added a position in the CJC, a program manager position. One of the biggest things I know that the Alderman of the Third always talks about, but people just in general, is how do we support our building inspectors and our building division? So under the support of Alderman Sonnier and Alderman Devotee, they actually had an amendment to increase those building inspectors to three. But what Paul Payne ended up doing and said is take those positions, or instead of including three building inspectors, what he did is he combined those positions and made it where we have a building inspector two to be able to uplift one of our inspectors to be able to move on to a building vision two. We also added an environmental health officer in the building division, which was a recommendation from the budget committee. There was a change to our fire department that included an instrumental tech and secretary position to full-time, and we reduced them from per performance. There was some changes that myself and Alderman Sanye tried to do where we tried to decrease positions from the street department and put it into right to council. Several positions that we felt was not going to be utilized, but after Paul Payne talked with those departments, they actually restored those positions back to the street department. We included or restored another position also in the equipment service division that restored two positions that eventually the budget committee took out and was able to repurpose that money in a different way. With all the leftover funding that was had after those cuts, we did have some additional funding from personal services to actually add to Right to Counsel. Right to counsel is one of the legislations that we've passed at this Board of Aldermen, and advocates have been asking for more funds so that Eastern Missouri, I believe is the people who does the contract, could be able to have more funds so that they could be able to hire more attorneys. There were some other additional cuts that ENA made outside of the budget committee that was basically some cleanup. So we corrected the schedule, the Prop NS schedule that had no additional dollars change in the billing division. We also fixed an error. They added a non-personal support account in the mail room, so ENA fixed that. We was able to also add or There's a board bill when it comes to the sheriffs that we passed with the pay adjustment so we was able to make sure that the pay adjustment for the new sheriff pay bill that the Alderman from the 10th is carrying that that is also included so that additional raises that the sheriff department will be getting it is now accounted for in the budget and one of the biggest thing that I want to get to that I know will be A fruitful conversation is, so the police board of commissioners know a police board that was passed by state statute, that was passed by individuals in Jefferson City, and a few weeks ago passing, or last week, but made the announcement a few weeks ago that they was going to give a raise to their rank and file members, starting at 18%, some, or 16%, some 18, and some 22. With them doing that and eventually voting on that resolution last week and the mayor voted no, we have to account for not necessarily their raises because their raises is already accounted for in the budget. If you go back and you watch the actual hearing, they said they already have the funds to account for their raises, but due to parity, We did have to increase and make sure that our fire department also get that same raise. So we was able to account for the fire department by cutting a million dollars out of the police judgment account, which they already have funds in their judgment account. This was additional funding that the city gave to the police department for additional funds they may need. But since they already have accounted funds for the judgment, we was able to take our ENA decided to take away a million dollars from the judgment account so that we could pay for our fire department raise increase that we now have to do due to the actions of the police commissioners, as well as there was a cut from $446,000 out of a GEMT fund, which is grounds... emergency medical transfer funds that typically the fire department use those funds to purchase additional equipment for their trucks. And we was able to cut some of those funds out of that without cutting any city employees in the city of St. Louis. I want to be very clear because like I say, I know it's going to be stated the budget that was brought in front of the budget committee was a budget that was crafted by Director Paul Payne. It was not the budget that the police commissioners asked for. This was a budget that Paul Payne had crafted by going off the previous years of looking at the police budget. And if you look at our budget books and you look at the police budget over the last several years, we've continued to increase the police budget. They always get a higher budget compared to any other public safety or any other department. The budget that is in front of us is a budget that follows the state statute that requires us to pay our police department at 23 percent. But this is not the budget that the police commissioners adopted. This was a budget that Director Paul Payne brought in front of this commission. budget committee and this budget committee did ask the police department to come in front of us and they did not. The budget committee had ample time when Director Payne was actually in front of us to present on the police budget which was not a quick meeting to be able to ask questions around the police budget. But the reality is we are under state law. And I know a lot of folks have issues with that. That's why you see various lawsuits happening right now if it's the president, if it's the mayor, if it's the alderman from the 9th and the alderman from the 6th with their lawsuit to challenge the current law that's in front of us. However, while I may be frustrated about the actions that the police department has made, I feel very confident in the budget that is in front of us, because outside of this budget, we are also giving city employees 3% raises, and we made some huge, in my opinion, additions and changes to various departments that had asked for that support. And, you know, I think Our first responders are extremely important, and we know that, unfortunately, we have a charter that says if the police get a raise, fire department get a raise. I know if folks don't like it, they can change it, but I will say if this budget does not go through, we will not be ultimately projecting funds for our firefighters to make sure that they also get a raise in this budget, because the way the process goes, is the Board of Aldermen would have to take up the original budget that was voted out of ENA. And that original budget did not account for any of the changes that the Budget Committee made. It does not account for the errors that other departments made, such as even the airport had an error salary savings of over $1.3 million. So we had to fix those through ENA. through the budget committee to make sure that we actually have a budget that doesn't have errors, also the changes from the budget committee, but as well as pay our firefighters because of the parity that we have with the police department. So with that, Madam President, after months of committee hearings and hours of testimony, And listening to the public, I will open up from any questions from my colleagues.

Any further discussion? Any further discussion? Alderman from the 9th.

Hello. There we go. Thank you. So we just passed this budget out of committee. 22 minutes ago so that we can suspend the rules which we just did about 10 minutes ago in order to move this budget forward today and perfect it. The Board of ENA approved this budget last Thursday in response to changes made by the Board of Police Commissioners last Wednesday, not even one week ago. The changes that we're approving today reflect a million-dollar increase for the fire department, and that sounds great, but it's only because we had to increase police salaries. The commanding officers getting raises of 16 to 22 percent, larger than any other department gets in this board bill, in this budget. And it is putting us in a position where these are ongoing costs and we will not be able to repeat this next year. The mayor even stated in the Board of Police Commissioners last week as they were approving these raises that this is not sustainable. This would lead to cuts in future years. I find moving this board bill forward today to be very problematic. I am incredibly concerned. This is not the normal process that we follow. It is not a democratic process as these decisions are being made by an unelected board of police and silos away from really any input by the people that it affects, our residents, the people who pay taxes in the city. Here in this country, we operate in government by the consent of the governed. And if we acquiesce to what the Board of Police Commissioners have done at the 11th hour, at the last minute, we are giving up our freedoms, giving up our autonomy, and we are putting ourselves in a position where we will have to make cuts in the future to the departments that serve our residents and our people. I am reading headlines right now. Headlines from across the region. St. Louis area school districts look at tax increases amid financial strain. Webster adopts FY27 budget with $1.7 million shortfall. Kirkwood to spend $9.9 million from reserves this budget year. St. Louis County Special School District freezes salaries district-wide with projected $83 million deficit. St. Louis County passes 2026 budget with $48 million in cuts. Page warns of unintended consequences. St. Louis County offices closed on Fridays as budget battle escalates. Page, closing $80 million St. Louis County budget deficit without cutting services requires Rams money, new sales tax. Missouri House advances budget that taps surplus to close $2 billion deficit. We are headed into choppy financial waters. Federal money is drying up as we spend it down. The Rams money we perfected last week and we are going to send it out the door spending the entire amount. If we're doing salary increases of this magnitude for the police department, which then requires pay parity per our charter to also do in the fire department, it does not matter what budget tricks we did this year to fix the problem. It will create an ongoing problem that will hurt our city in the future. I voted no on committee to advance this budget, and I will vote no again today on the floor. because I do not stand for this undemocratic, unjust, and dangerous process for making our budget. And I stand with city employees. I know that some of these changes help city employees, but I stand with city employees because I don't believe in advancing something that is unsustainable and will hurt them in the future. And I'm happy to answer any questions about what this year's budget process has been like. But as I speak today, I can see that barely any of you are paying attention anyway. And that to me is damning.

Other woman from the first.

Thank you, Madam President, members of the board. Will the alderman from the 14th yield to questions? The alderman from the 14th yields questions from the alderwoman from the first.

Absolutely.

Alderwoman, you may proceed. Thank you. Thank you, alderman. This budget process has been unlike any other in my time at the board of aldermen. Normally, we have a budget in front of us that feels difficult for so many reasons, whether the increases in pay are not enough, whether the city is not able to fulfill all the obligations that it normally has. And this year, we have a budget in which one department is kind of operating outside of the rest of the city budget, and we're forced to deal with that in the budget process. Can you talk a little bit to me about how that changed this year and how you had to work through that piece?

Yeah, thank you, Alderman. So since being and I know we served on budget kind of a few years ago when Mayor Spencer then was the chair of the budget. You know, the Board of Aldermen already always say is not in a place where we're successful. get a budget done in a timeline that doesn't always feel rushed, right? Because what I respect about our process is we hear from every department. We go through department's budget. We say, how's your budget going? What are some shortfalls? What are some things you need to change? And typically, at least in my time being at the board, we've always got the budget done by July 1st. But if I take us back to the time where Now Mayor Kara Spencer was the chair of budget. During one of those times, we did have to suspend the rules to perfect it so that we could hear it the following week. So it's not, I would say, uncommon that this board has suspended the rules to make sure the budget has got done. I would say what has been different this year is being the budget chair. after ENA votes it out, I always make sure that we have a meeting that very following Monday. Sometimes we don't even have budget books printed out. But I understand how short of a window that we're in, and the earlier that we're able to start with the budget committee, the earlier we're able to allow the process to move back to ENA. So if the Board of Aldermen makes any changes, It has to go back to ENA. We have to request a meeting for ENA to take up a special meeting, which they may not have to do. And then from that special meeting, they have to vote it out and it has to come back to the budget committee before we send it to the floor. So I always try to start early to make sure there's a buffer. We was on track this year. We sent a budget, in my opinion, as Paul said last year, in record time to ENA due to the hard work of all the budget committee members. We got our amendments in, and ENA took some of those amendments. They didn't take them all. During that process, the Board of Police Commissioners, you know, which I don't think anyone is excited about how the process is going with the police commissioners. Unfortunately, that is the state statute, and I'm sure this won't be the first of many obstacles they throw in our way that we try to figure out how do we actually prevail through to move forward for city government. But the police commissioners decided that, you know, they were going to do a raise for their hire up officers in the white shirts. When they decided to do that, due to charter, we or ENA decided to hold off on the budget to send it back to the budget committee. So we've ultimately been waiting for about two weeks to adopt these changes so we didn't have to perfect or suspend the rules and so that it could have been second read and then perfected and third read like most bills are. But since there is a pay parity, ENA had to wait So last week to figure out what the police commissioners was going to do if they was going to vote on the resolution or not. And I want to be very clear. If they voted on that resolution and we voted the budget out or we didn't vote the budget out like that is going to ultimately happen regardless. The police raise and the resolution that they're offering is going to happen regardless. I think what's important that we're making sure that we are doing, due to parity, that we're accounting for our fire department to make sure that they also get the raise because we know that we have a parity. And what the police... department said was that they already have money in their budget accounted for so it will not change the budget this year however we know raises will we have to look for for the future but yes that wrench of uh the police commissioners um doing that kind of raise at the last minute had to slow down the process because if we have to follow the law, we have to ensure that there is pay parity between our police and fire. So that's why ENA made up of the president, the mayor, and the comptroller all voted to make sure that that parity also matched with the fire department and would slow down this budget process for... the Board of Aldermen, and I know I'm probably going off. I want to make very clear the only change that the Budget Committee voted on today was the changes that ENA decided to do to reduce the police department's budget and add to the fire. The other changes that I mentioned earlier were changes that this budget committee actually voted yes on to send out to ENA and had ample amount of time and we knew what those changes were to the budget. The changes that we voted on today does not change the landscape of the budget because we're taking away and adding in a different way for our fire department also to get that parity.

And when you mentioned the laws that the Board of Aldermen needs to adhere to, we're talking about a few different things. We have state control that requires a certain percentage of the budget of general revenue go towards the police budget.

Correct.

Did we meet that this year with what is in the current budget?

We did.

And the police commission wanted above and beyond what that is?

Yes. If we took the police commission budget, it would have been more than 23%. So this is not the police commission's budget. And that's what's being argued in litigation. This budget... is thank you to Paul Payne, the man that has been doing this for over 30-some years, who's an expert, because we love to take expert's advice, who's an expert that looked at what the police department was asking for and made sure that, and again, I think if you go back and you watch the committee, he said there was much that wasn't changed. I think the most that was changed was internal services, and that was actually reduced. And last year, this board of aldermen committee, budget committee, voted for more funding in internal services. So this is a very similar budget, honestly, that the budget committee voted on last year outside of the last-minute audible that the police board of commissioners put on us.

And they voted for that within the current framework of the budget that they know the police department will get based on the state law that the city has to follow and provide.

Correct.

Simultaneously, okay.

No, I was going to say, correct. The raises that the police department commissioners voted on is raises that already fits within their budget and does not make our budget go beyond 23%. Right.

That's the 23%. But the problem with the other law that we have to adhere to is... The parity for the fire department is something outside of that 23%. But you're saying that it was a million dollars found. Can you explain that harder again? The million dollars that was in this, what's currently in front of us today, to pay for the needed increases because of parity for the fire department that are impacted, where did that come from?

So the million dollars came out of the judgment fund from the police department budget.

And that does not affect that where the city is still meeting the state statute of 23%, even without a million somewhere else.

Correct. It still meets the 23%. And they also, for judgments, which is judgments and settlements, They also already have funding in their budget for that. This year, the city was like, we'll give them additional funding for it to be able to help with their judgments and settlements. But accounting for their raises, which will already not offset the 23%, we end up taking the million out of judgments to make sure that we can pay for the parity of our fire department without... potentially cutting any FTEs, full-time employees from any department and other city services so that we can continue to have a healthy health department, building division, and other departments and not at the risk of the increase of the raises that the police department was requesting.

And I think this is where, you know, the alderman from the 9th, I think, made really good points about how this affects the budget going forward. I think that was always going to be an issue because it's 23% year one, and then it will continue to increase until it hits 25% three years in. Yes. So... We were already set up to fail by state control.

Correct.

And I think the majority of the members of this board agree with that, just wanted to control the state local for exactly this purpose and how it affects us going forward. Today we're talking about this year's budget. How do you feel this year's budget will either set us up for failure or success in the coming years? And is there a concern that you have about what we passed today and any additional changes that need to be made in order to be in a better situation next year?

Yeah, no, I mean, I feel good about this year's budget. You know, I don't like the 23%, but the reality is it's something that is state statute now. It is the law, and we got to follow it, right? And as you say, moving forward, outside of this year's budget, maybe we'll be saying this for the next two, three years, but next year it'll be 24%. Next year it'll be 25%. And I think that Director Payne is going to be tasked with a heavy duty, especially when they get to 25%, to start to probably ask departments, hey, you got a lot of vacancy here, you got a lot of vacancy there. Where are we going to have to start to cut that additional funding to make sure we account for police raises and this year's budget, but also moving forward? And who knows any future raises that the Board of Police Commissioners said, now we're going to give our rank and file officers an additional raise. But I think what Paul, Director Payne, did, knowing that this state statute had passed, he looked and made sure that he was a little tighter on departments. As he always said, departments always ask for a lot, and he makes sure that they get what they need at the bare minimum. But I know there's various departments in here that If you ask Kim Hagel from Parks Department that came and said, I feel really good about the Parks Commission budget because the things that I asked for from Director Payne is in this budget. If you ask, I think it was, actually all the members under, is that Rich Bradley with Parks? Greg Hayes. Greg Hayes. If you ask all the members under Greg Hayes' department, they said, we appreciate the current budget that they got. Rec centers, will rec centers want more money? They will, i.e., there is some of that in RAMS. But, you know, every department under Greg Hayes was like, we appreciate the budget that we got. So I believe, honestly, the budget process starts before ENA gets it. You know, Paul Payne started talking to directors in early January and say, hey, send a budget. And then they have conversations in February to figure out what makes sense and what don't make sense. Is this, I would say, outside of the police part that's in here? The changes that was coming in front of the board was the changes that this budget committee voted for. And my opinion had all voted for and felt comfortable sending those changes to ENA. The change that only is in front of us now is a change that is not the police department, but it is us giving more money to the fire department. And I feel comfortable taking it from the police department for their judgment settlement. to be able to support our firefighters and the GMT fund. I may not love that that came from there, but I know that even when the fire chief came, and I know the old woman from the 6th was looking to change that because there is always additional funds, and the GEMT fund, where she was looking to maybe change that so it can go to salaries because they do have leftover money that typically is in that fund. From the two cuts that we're making to be able to support our fire department, I feel comfortable with, because these are the changes that the budget committee voted out. And I think there's getting some confusion between the police actions and what they did, which did throw a wrench in the budget process, but it didn't change the outcomes of the number in this FY27 budget. And it still meets the statutory recommendations of 23%. Right.

I think the biggest concern that I have as the years go by and we have to meet that 23, 24, 25% is We cannot find the money through cutting vacancies because those vacancies, the money should be staying within each of those departments to pay everyone more. I mean, the starting salary of a building inspector in the city of St. Louis versus the starting salary of a building inspector in Kirkwood is tens of thousands of dollars different now. I think it is so difficult to be in this position where there's almost no good answer because the city of St. Louis has to meet the state mandated budget number But it apparently doesn't have to meet any other goal, like buildings that don't fall down and parks that are maintained. I don't know why that's not expected as well, because finding the money in those departments is not, to the point of other aldermen, not a long-term solution at all, not something that's tenable for our city and the people who live here to deal with. And I don't know what the solution is as long as state controls in effect, as long as the city is not looking at keeping the money in each of those budgets for each of those departments and finding ways to pay those folks more. And I know there are many bills to increase people's salaries by 3% across the board, and that is barely even keeping up with inflation, in fact, not really keeping up with inflation. And doesn't put us anywhere near how other cities are paying very similar workers. So, you know, we end up losing a lot of our people to other areas. Can you talk a little bit about that and any conversation that was had around that piece in the budget committee?

Yeah, I would say that conversation as we, and I think you voted for, was outside of the 3% pay increase, what that pay study did that was through every group that did it was also it changes for a lot of our departments. People that are coming in won't be starting at that minimum salary. You know, some of those minimum salaries is actually lifted up. So people that are looking for a job in the city of St. Louis maybe were as a building inspector at 43. Now that position is at 46. Not much, but it is a start. And I think, you know, we continue either through this past administration, through this Board of Alder, through pay bills that are moving through. um outside of just city employees but some of these county offices and you know that alders are carrying such as yourself you know we're continuing to try to figure out ways to be creative to support our city employees um understanding that we're like you say we're in a situation that as my mom always says like robbing peter to pay paul right and the reality is this is going to be ongoing tough conversations over the next two years to figure out how do we ensure which i totally agree with you and that's why i'm glad that ENA did not actually cut full-time employees if those vacancies did exist or not to make sure that this budget uh helped the fire department they found a different way to make sure that city workers uh positions was not cut but you know Long call, I think we're going to have to figure out ways that it's going to take people like me and you as elected officials, the comptroller, the president, and the mayor to figure out how do we continue to support our city employees. Like you say, 3% does not keep up with inflation. So what else can we do? Outside of the one-time lump sum that I talked to two city employees at Gatha, and they were so excited that they was like, thank you. Thank you for this. Because those little things go a long way with morale. And I think we're starting to try to make those adjustments in this new Board of Alder and this new time of administration. But those are going to be, honestly, ongoing conversations that I wouldn't say have an answer for you right now. I think that's a conversation that we have to sit down with Director Light and personnel and figure out, you know, how do we start to look at how do we compensate our employees more, right? What is their additional incentives? that we can give to our employees so that if it's not wages, what are some other incentives that we can give our employees in the city of St. Louis to make them, you know, be appreciative to want to work for the city. That's going to be an ongoing conversation and ultimately the budget as it goes to 23, 24, and 25. But for this budget, I feel good that we're in that 23. We're not cutting staff. We were able to give raises to people across the board. And we made several changes when you talk about building inspectors. We made a change from this budget committee, which if it don't go through, that change will not move forward. we moved and created some space for a building inspector too. That was one of the acts that the building division asked for and they wasn't able to get it from the ENA process. But what I love about the budget committee is we have members that dive deep into it and was able to make recommendation changes where there is an additional position to be able to support the building division out of position ones that they made it to twos.

So if we do not perfect this, do not move this budget forward, what is the change that will go into effect with the budget? Because the last budget passed by ENA goes into effect if the Board of Aldermen fails to pass a budget. How will that be different than what's in front of us today?

I can tell you what won't go into effect. I would say all the months and work of the changes that the budget committee made won't go into effect. I would say the million dollars will go back into the police department for judgment. We will not be giving in this budget unless I'm assuming maybe later down the line ENA could, I guess, do a special meeting. But what Paul Payne said today, If we do not pass this budget, there will be a deficit in the fire to fire firefighters budget. So we will not be giving firefighters a raise, love it or dislike it. It is parity that we have to do. And I think we're doing that responsibility to make sure that we're accounting for so what won't go into effect is some of those things that I just mentioned to you what will go into effect is the original ENA and outside of that there are some issues that several departments had in that original budget we take the airport they had a savings salary that they over accounted for of 1.3 million dollars which is in currently the ENA budget that they voted out The budget committee made the amendment to fix that. So there's several errors already if it's a building division that they had to correct the prop and as personal schedule or the mail room needed to make some changes to their accounts. Our ward capital funds exhibit is not in the original budget that ANA voted out. It has a total number, but the exhibit that breaks it down per ward is not in that budget. So park ranger saving, recreation, division, security contract, citywide accounts, or the sheriff pay bill that the alderwoman from the 10th is carrying to do the pay adjustments for sheriffs is not in that original bill. So if we do not vote this out, outside of the changes that the budget committee made, there's errors that are in the budget, there's board bills that are pending in front of us, or pay bills for people in the city of St. Louis to be able to get. There's funds that are over-accounted for in the airport department that we need to make sure are fixed. So if we don't vote out the budget today, this is bigger than the police department. We don't vote out the budget today, the police department gets the raise, period. And it's accounted for in their budget already. This is... About the vast majority of all city employees and other priorities that need to be fixed in this budget to make it an actual budget that is not that doesn't have errors.

This is my last question for you, and I appreciate all.

Look, keep going, because I think this is I think is important and. This is probably a huge document outside of board bills that we do. When you're talking about funding our city department, when you're talking about funding the city of St. Louis, with this new wrench of 23, 24, 25, I think these are important conversations. And I also want to make sure that they're accurate conversations of what's on the record of not just one department, because... as much as i'm pissed off about it too i know there's something bigger at stake that we need to make sure we get across the finish line and this isn't the last time that we as a board again there's lawsuits out here that aldermans are a part of to challenge that but only way i think we fix that between that 23 24 and 25 is through legal processes sure not voting down the budget okay so

The concern I have with the 23% and this $1 million that's available to move, why was there any penny over 23% if we had money to move? I don't understand that.

That was a question that Paul answered. They only went over 23% a little bit. It did not get up to 24%. When you talk about benefits and salaries, that also made that percentage go up. Most of the stuff that was already in the budget, as far as their additional equipment, the additional things that they already need, was the same amount that typically was last year. But what made some of that go up and also potentially accounting for that lifetime insurance that is now being challenged is what that was accounted for for that additional 23% that is a little bit over.

Okay, so now it is at 23%, not anymore.

From my understanding, it meets the state statute requirement of being at 23%.

Okay. Thank you for answering my questions. I appreciate your time. I think the reason I had so many questions is that this has been one of the most complicated budget seasons that I've lived through here at the Board of Aldermen and made more complicated by having this outside agency with... seemingly no interest in a balanced budget trying to direct so much of the work we do here that really has a negative effect on so much of the other city services. And it's been just really frustrating to deal with. So I appreciate everyone on the Budget Committee trying to work through that and deal with this. And I look forward to hearing from the rest of my colleagues on this bill. Thank you. Alderman from the 5th.

Madam President, members of the Board, I rise in the same position as the Alderman of the 9th in against this particular budget. And I think it is important to provide a couple points of clarity as well as to make sure that we are speaking accurately about what is in front of us today. The Alderman from the 14th has mentioned a couple of times that this particular budget puts forward an amendment following actions by the Board of Police Commissioners, raising the pay of the rank and file of the police department. That is not accurate. It is not accurate. That action undertaken by the Board of Police Commissioners served to raise the... the pay of supervisory or command staff. So let's be crystal clear on this. We are not here today because of a raise of pay of the rank and file. In fact, if that's what we were here today, I'd have a hard time standing up here in opposition. I realize we need more officers on the street. I hear the Board of Police Commissioners when they say we need more butts in our patrol cars. I hear them when they say we must be competitive with respect to the rates of what we are paying the guys in blue who are on the streets. That is not the action that was taken. It wasn't. Which then leads to the parity issue, the discussion about parity. And again, when we talk about the effect of this particular amendment, it is raising to the extent as near as possible. directed in our charter, supervisory or command staff in the fire department. Not rank and file firefighters. Not the guys that are doing the actual day-to-day work on the streets. We must... However you stand on this, make sure you understand that point. We are talking about raises of pay, significant raises of pay for supervisory and command staff. Understand that when you cast this vote. And I think then that leads to a second criticism the way this is getting discussed here today. The change in the budget isn't just a reallocation of $1 million from the police budget, from the item talking in terms of judgment accounts, into the fire department. There is another significant change here to the tune of $446,000. Let me say that again, $446,000. And it goes with respect to capital. As the alderman for the 14th mentioned, ground emergency medical transportation. This isn't an insignificant thing. These are things like ambulances. Ambulances. And anybody who has talked to a firefighter or an EMT or a paramedic knows that our fire department is severely understaffed with respect to emergency medical responses, which goes to, at the very beginning, the units used to transport patients, ambulances. That's what we're affecting here today when you vote on this. And I think the other issue then goes to just my problem with the rot, the systematic problem with this state legislation. Because again, we're all functioning now in silos that then have these domino effects on what otherwise happens. And again, just sticking within the fire department. where we have massive issues with pay with respect to our EMTs and our paramedics who we train, they serve us well, and then they move to our competition in St. Louis County. Why? Because of pay. And those folks aren't going to benefit from this at all. At all. Which brings me back to my initial criticism. The final point I want to make, and again, I might be being a ticky dot here, but this goes back to, again, our charter provisions. And if we vote no today, and again, I am probably in the minority on this. I get it. But it doesn't go back, per our charter, it doesn't go back to the original budget filed by ENA. Rather, under And I lost it. I believe it's Article 16, Section 3, the most recent budget approved by ENA. And I think that's why it's important for us to take a stand. ENA has come down and said what it thinks and what the city must do. But we do have an important role here. When the budget committee met, of which I'm a member, for many, many weeks and many, many months, we made hard decisions. There was a lot. And I know the older woman from the 7th, and I worked on a bill to fund three building inspector 2 positions. It didn't get across the line. And we need it. Why didn't it get across the line? Because there's not sufficient funds. So... I was listening, Alderman of the Ninth. I was paying attention, and I will join you today in voting no on this particular legislation.

We'll do Alderwoman from the 6th, and then the 12th, and then the 8th.

Thank you, Madam President. I rise in somewhat pained support of this bill. I think we all know we are kind of preaching to the choir here on why, on our objections, the people who should really be Earnestly and honestly hearing us are both the police board of commissioners and the legislators of the state who voted for this. We know here at this board that it is our responsibility to pass a budget before July 1st. We also know that this budget was essentially forced on us because of the police commission. we know as legislators and frankly anybody with common sense or good sense and you can take that as a pun knows that you can't have a budget and ignore a quarter of the budget you can't operate a budget only looking at part of it and not the whole and this budget is reconciling the fact that we were as a city essentially forced to adjust our budget because of the police commission ignoring the parts of the whole we do know that city workers are underpaid. They continue to be underpaid. But this budget, for the first time in many years, attempts to at least not only give raises of 3%, but get people within 5% of their regional market value for their job. It's not excessive pay. It's a start. It's a start from where the city needs to be. But to be able to give the salaries and pay the people what they're worth, we need to do that in recognition of all of our city employees and not just part of them. I think it's also important, as Alderman Devotee and Alderman Browning pointed out, that we have spent many, many hours, many weeks looking over this budget, talking to departments over and over again about what they need. And we know that, again, this is there is just like there is no perfect bill. This is a bill. There is no perfect budget. There is... We know that firefighters also are city workers who are in need of pay increases. I think what Alderman Devotee didn't talk about but raised in our committee hearing is that this raise does not apply to EMTs. We know that EMTs provide some of the most critical services. They're some of the most underpaid workers. And while they are civil service workers, they are left out in the pay parity process, which... leaves them not only with lower salaries when they're already underpaid, it leaves the city continually in this problem that we don't have emergency staff responding to emergencies, enough ambulances and qualified EMTs to respond to the needs of our city, the literal needs of our city when people are in the most pain. So I think that is something that needs to be addressed. Again, I think that we all here generally know that why we need a balanced budget and why you can't ignore a part for the whole. But I think the people, again, who really need to be hearing us are the people who haven't been listening to us. And that's the police board of commissioners, and that's the Missouri legislator, and frankly, the governor. Thank you.

Other woman from the 12th.

President, members of the board. I don't vote for the budget. I haven't voted for the budget for a lot of years. I've been through 25, 27 budgets. I want to say when I first came here, we were under Missouri State Police control in the 90s. And we stayed that way until sometime in, what, 2004 or something like that or whatever, someplace in there. We went back up. No, I'm sorry. We stayed in the 90s, and then in 2013, we got control of the police for the first time in a very long time back under the city of St. Louis. It was 2013. But the time that we were under police control before, we didn't have... an amendment to the Constitution, which was an amendment to the Hancock Amendment, which allowed them to do our budget like that. So it was a very different experience. It's very different when now they can control your budget. They did have a police board, and in many ways, the police operated better that way, but not once they take your budget and try to tell you how you have to vote. I'll say that. um when i listened to um people talking about or speaking to the fact about not voting for it i wasn't going to vote for it anyway and i kind of looked forward to how this whole thing of the board of aldermen um if we all vote no and they submit the budget then here's what i uh thinking about, they can't force members of the Board of Aldermen how to vote. So I was looking forward to how they were going to do if we all voted no, because just because you pass a state law, we still have the ability to vote yes and no, and they cannot force members of the Board of Aldermen to vote a certain way. The Alderman from the 16th brought some points up. He talked about the amendment. The 16th? The amendment that took the charter that gave parity was not always part of the charter. And it was because of a lot of lobbying by the firefighters in the state and in the city because they wanted to get parity. As the alderman from the... Fifth said, it was not parity for everyone. And if you go and look at the charter, it actually lists who gets parity. Those are the white shirts, the people that maybe we have a little too many of, not the people who actually do the work. That's also the problem we have in the police department is that we pay a lot of people that maybe need to be out in the streets. So we have always for a very long time now had too many white shirts and not many people in the blue uniforms. Um... if we, the Alderman from the 9th talked about, I don't even remember which one, maybe it was the 9th and maybe it was the 1st, talked about what we could do or how we could get this back. One of the things we can do is we may have to go back out and amend the state constitution because when the state constitution was amended to give the exception to the Hancock Amendment, that was when only Kansas City was the only state-controlled police. And I think a lot of us didn't take notice, although I did, because I voted no against that one too. But they actually had an amendment after the Hancock Amendment, because for many years, you could not have unfunded mandates. At first, we didn't like it, but it really turned out to be something really good for the cities, because it stopped Jefferson City from doing a lot of meddling in our business and running our finances. But someplace along the line, they quietly did it while only Kansas City was under control of the state. And they got people to change the Constitution of Missouri, which was the Hancock Amendment, for an exception for public safety and the police. And that was a mistake. Whenever somebody is doing something to somebody, an arc, you better look at what they're doing, because here's what happens. You may be the next one. You're so saying, well, it's not me. I don't care. And then the same thing happens to you. I've seen that in the government in the city of St. Louis so many times. It's not funny. They don't think it's applying to them. And then it does. So the city of St. Louis may not have been awake, but maybe this is a time that we put all the people out from Kansas City, from St. Louis, but for other municipalities, too, to say, look, this is what happened to us. What's to keep them from putting you under control and doing the same thing? What's to keep a small group of legislators that have no business, no business appointing a board that's deciding that they're going to mandate what the city of St. Louis has to pay their police? Now, I say that. But on the other hand, I'm for raises. I'm for raises for the police. I want them to make a decent living. I don't want them to even be able to work secondary because I want a police force that is fully engaged in protecting our community. So I want them to make enough money, but I want that to be a local decision. I don't want that to be some state reps that live someplace else. By the way, not doing that to the community that they live in. they're not telling their community we get to control your police force finances I don't believe that if we vote no that there's anything that they can do. I've been taken to court before about trying to force me how to vote. And it went to federal court. And the federal judge says, there's a case out there saying, you cannot tell the alderman how to vote. That goes to all of you. They can't mandate how we vote. If we vote no, and the alderman from the 5th talked about, it is a section 16. If we vote no, and this is what it says. It says, notwithstanding the provisions of Article 16, For section 16 of the charter of the city of St Louis, in the event, the board of Alderman has not finally active upon said proposed ordinance or ordinances by the start of the fiscal year, the proposed ordinance or ordinances recommended by the board of DNA and apportionment. Or, and it's absent by the budget director shall be considered to have been approved by the board of Alderman. Now, what's interesting to me, we've always taken that to say that we had to approve the board, but it doesn't say we have to approve it. It says, if we have not finally acted. Could finally act that we voted. No, that's a final action. So that's just something we never have. done, but one time, I will take that back, since I've been here, the former president took the board bill one time and wouldn't let us vote on it, and the mayor at that time was Lida Crewson, and that went into being because we were not allowed to vote on the bill because he had it, and he kept it for reasons that we had changed the bills in ways that he didn't want to. But other than that, I don't know that has not finally acted is not requirement that we vote yes on it. I don't think it's been tested anyway. But I know that I would not be voting for this bill for a lot of reasons. The budgets always have a lot of things. And I hear the alderman from the 14th talking about Paul Payne. Paul Payne always, for the years that I've been here, we've been here for almost the same time, had his hands in the budget. He works with the budget. He submits them to the mayors. They can say yes or no. But Paul Payne, the budget director, and even before Paul Payne, so I was here when Darlene Green was the budget director, when Frank Jackson. So I've been through several budget directors. Those budget directors always had their hands in the budget and working with ENA and the mayor. And mostly they get along with them. And so they make changes if it is required. I also want to note that- The, the, the committee has the right to take things out of a budget and it cannot be put back in. So we don't use that. We used it a lot when I was new. In fact, that's why I got put off in a, because at 1 point, they tried to do a lot of. promotions for fire captains that was not fair to some other fire captains. And we cut it out the budget. And by the time they knew it, it was nothing they could do about it. And so the next year I was not on that budget, not because I didn't know how to use the budget, but because I did know how to use the budget. I've been on almost all these committees. It is important that we send a message to state government that you do not want the federal government to come in telling you how to run the state of Missouri and how your budget should be. But I don't understand why you think it's all right that you come into the city of St. Louis and tell us how to vote. If I wasn't already going to be voting no, I would be voting no. I would also be voting no because when I look at what the city of St. Louis looks like in North St. Louis now with the forestry workers, we added a few forestry workers. We need to add 200, looks like, because we look like we're living in a jungle in much of the city. They haven't cut grass in my ward. They started in June. I raised so much hill. earlier that they used to start in May, they started in April, but we didn't see them to June. And then they come in and they got contractors who whack and break the law and drag stuff out into the middle of the streets. So you might as well not have them. You do better to hire citizens in a city who live in the community to cut the grass. I would not vote for any budget that allows the forestry department to continue to not cut our grass and make neighborhoods so that they have to live with tall grass that is in violation of our own laws. forestry weeds and stuff that haven't been cuffed in weeks and months and months out into the middle street in violation of our own laws. Having a rule that says we cut lots every four weeks or we cut property every six to eight weeks and we cut parks in a different... We don't go into a community or neighborhood and cut all at the same time. So what happens is that we end up if you have a neighborhood that has vacant lots and vacant properties, they can do the ridiculous action of going and cut the lots and leaving the vacant properties next to somebody's house not cut. So there's always something if you have vacant properties in your ward that is not being cut. And then they're telling the citizens don't cut the front because the contractors that we hire may not come and cut it if the front is cut. You're telling the citizens that they have to live next door to tall grass, which now has vermin and animals and everything else, that they have to just live with it because we have an ignorant policy about not cutting a whole neighborhood at one time, that we're going to leave that neighborhood looking like people don't care. Then we're going to blame that neighborhood instead of the foul, ignorant policies that we have with the city of St. Louis. The other thing is about what do we do? What do we do? We're under this. Who says, and I know this is going to upset people, nobody says that we have to keep a police force. So maybe we have a joint police force with somebody else, that we do something else. We need to look at creative ways because we should not stay under police. someone or something or the state that says, we get to tell you how much you pay your employees. You will pay them and you will pay just the top. You're not matching for the ranks and file. You're matching for the top. But that all happened because, again, the fire department went and did lobbying in Jeff City and came back here. And so we then encapsulated in the charter what they had already gotten up in Jeff City was they wanted parity for their top rank and file. It is ridiculous that we are we have a law like this is ridiculous that we go on with it and try to act like this is the only way that we can do it. There are other things that we can do. We can amend the budget. But what we should do is fight and resist. I think last year, and I've been voting no for a long time, and people have been here for a long time, the Alderman from the 3rd, the Alderman from the 4th, other ones, 2nd, 13th, they know. I've been voting no for a long time. Last year, I think we had maybe four or five people vote no because we're not paying the people to vote. amount of money that we should pay our employees and so in protest we had a great number of people who voted no that was pretty awesome to me and in protest in the same way we ought to have a great number of people that do not vote for this board bill and let's see what they will do if we don't vote for this board bill and we send them a message to say we're not going to be told how to vote And I'm talking to the police board, to the governors, to the state legislators. You cannot mandate our budget. You cannot put us out of business. You cannot make us have to lay off all other city workers because we have to pay up police. The police is not going to have to worry. You all ought to be worried about this because if you keep doing this and you support this and you think you've won, you will not win. We will have a city that does not have anyone living in it, but people will get the heck out of here. I've seen hundreds of thousands of people since I first got elected moved out of this city. But if you start not paying city workers, and now city workers can live any place they want to, they're not following our charter that says you have to live in the city, and they can go other places, that's what they will do, and it will be followed by less and less services. And one of the things that we've always had was halfway decent services until the last 8, 10 years, and then it just went to hell. If we do not have good city services, we can't pick up trash. We can't cut grass. We can't tear down properties. We can't move forward to grow our city. Then we're going to continue to lose our citizens. And that's going to be a mistake. We do not have to vote for this board bill, I would encourage. If you don't want to vote, no, vote present. But do not vote for this board bill because this is somebody akin to putting a gun to our head almost and saying, you have to do this because we put you in a check. And I don't think they have at all. I don't think they thought... What will I do or what will we do if the people just do not vote for it? If the members of the Board of Aldermen say, no, we're not going to go along and vote for this board bill that gives the police this money. And I think while we took a million dollars out for police settlement, we need to take all of the money out for police settlement. Because what happens is we pay for when the police get sued and oftentimes the case is found against the police, then we should not be paying for that. All of that money should come out. Everything that I've always stood up for the police for, you're making me take another look at what my positions are because you are not being paid. And I'm saying to the police board and to the governor and to the legislature, you are not being responsible. We did not always do it this way. We have state control before. It was not like this. But when you take over our budget, that is too much. And that is when you lose me. And I have always gotten along with the police. But you lose me when you take over our budget. And I will be voting no. Thank you. I have no further comments.

Alderwoman from the 8th. Thank you, Madam President. Will the alderman from the 14th yield for questions? The alderman from the 14th yields questioning from the alderwoman from the 8th. Alderman from the 14th. Yes, I yield for question. Alderwoman, you may proceed.

Thank you, Alderman. I know there's been a lot of robust discussion this morning, and I appreciate you being willing to lead this effort as budget chair and also take all of our questions today. I just had a couple of follow up questions for you just to make sure I'm in full understanding of the question that is before us with this amended version of the bill. My first question, if you could just reiterate, I know we've had a lot of discussion about the Board of Police Commissioners raises. So for clarity, could you reiterate if the raises that were contemplated by the Board of Police Commissioners were included in the original version of the budget that was put forward to ENA?

No, the raises, the one that ENA voted out back in early 2017. May, end of April, didn't have the raises. About three, four weeks ago, the police commissioners had a resolution, which they put on halt, and then they extended that to be able to give raises. And maybe I said it wrong to the ultimate of the fifth, but not for rank and file, but for the white shirts, the people in leadership. Rank and files did get... The people in leadership, white shirts are the ones who are getting the 16, I think 18, 20, and 22% raise. But that was not in the budget. That is what's currently in the budget now because state statute, we have to kind of abide by what they're saying.

OK, so that's what's currently in the budget now. And the question that is coming before us is whether or not we're going to put in place the pay parity that is required by our charter for the firefighters. Is that correct?

That is correct. And I know the alderman from the fifth had talked about the charter, but just listening to. our budget director, that's not clear, because if the Board of Aldermen votes no, we're not accepting what came out of ENA, and therefore we may revert back to the original budget that was passed out of ENA. It's better, you know, we're dealing with our city budget, and it's better to be safe to make sure that we're doing it right. And that's why I'm asking folks to vote out this one with amendments, because it does have the pay parity for our firefighters that we, by charter, have to do. You know, we can like it or love it. If folks don't like it, any of us can file a bill. But there has been the law for a long time that pay parity aligns with police support.

Okay. And thank you, Alderman, because you're getting to my question of trying to understand, you know, the question that before us, if this does not pass today, then what would inevitably be put in place? Because I understand the city does need to adopt a budget by July 1st. So is that correct that if we do not pass it today, there will still be a budget that is put in place and it will be a previous version of the version that came out of E&A?

Correct, but I think the concern is, is it that first version that they voted out that does not have the parity for fire department, that does not have all the errors and changes that are in the budget currently, because that was the original one that was voted out by ENA. This version has all the hard work that Director Paul Payne has done to do the cleanup, as well as implement the changes, as well as include the parity for our fire department.

Got you. And if you could just quickly talk about some of those other changes for the other departments that are covered in the budget. I know we spend a lot of time on police, but what are some of those other changes that would not be captured if we don't vote it out?

Yeah, I talked about them at the beginning, but I run them down to positions for the forestry department. You talk about two urban foresters. CJC project manager position. Alderman Devotee and Alderman Sanye did an amendment for building instructor ones that was not accepted. However, ENA did move money around for building inspector twos to be able to bring that up so that there could be one position for building inspector two. One environmental health officer. They restored cuts to the street department. They put money to Right to Counsel, which this Board of Aldermen has voted on and advocates have been asking for. There was a bunch of errors in the budget. I think I talked about that earlier. Earlier, one being almost $1.3 million of an error in the airport. They overcounted for that fund, so that is in the original budget that ENA voted on. There were some errors in the budget division. They had to correct some Prop NS personal schedule positions. They had to change some stuff in our mailroom. Our Ward Capitol exhibit is not in the original budget so outside of adding i think the positions that the budget committee made we also did or paul payne did some cleanup as he went back through the budget and seeing that there was errors in the budget that needed to be fixed on top of the parity that we need to address by firefighters

Okay, perfect. Thank you, Alderman, for answering my questions. I have no further questions for you. But I will just say a comment for the record. I know we've had a lot of discussion about the unfortunate position that we've been put in by the police department. I agree with everything that I believe the Alderman from the 5th. the alderman from the 9th and also the alderman from the 12th said about the fact that, you know, we have a responsibility here to speak up for our constituents and for what we believe is best for the city. And I think this unfortunate position that we've been put in is not the best one for what we know a lot of residents want to see in terms of public safety for our police department. I don't think that should be put on the backs of having a safe and functioning city by any means. And so I do hate the fact that we're here. I hate the fact that we don't have local control to be able to make these kinds of budgetary decisions in the best and most appropriate way. Um, and I do think there is going to be a lot of work that needs to be done, um, to just resolve that issue. And hopefully a lot of, um, folks watching the sea, the unfortunate consequence of what happens when a local government is not able to plan for itself financially in the way that it should. Um, so I agree with everything that folks said, and I agree, especially with the alderman from the ninth, um, portrayal of the regional problem that a lot of cities are financially in and us not putting ourselves in a worse position, I think, is fundamentally key. That being said, I do have a lot of questions about the unfortunate consequences of not putting forward a budget at all. And not funding our city and not paying the hard city workers that should not, you know, be cut short of due to this. I do agree. I think it was the older woman from the six said, you know, we have a responsibility to fund our government as well. So I well, I believe, you know, a stand needs to be taken. I don't know if that. there is a proper way of taking that stand at the consequence of not funding our government. I do think there's a lot of work that needs to be done on the back end to try to find a solution in the future years. And I know many folks are working on that through the legal channels that we have to be able to challenge this unfortunate situation. So I'll end with that comment. And I appreciate the Alderman from the 14th for answering my questions.

Any further discussion? Any further discussion? Alderwoman from the 12th.

Yes, Madam President. The alderman from the 14th would yield.

The alderman from the 14th yields questioning from the alderwoman from the 12th?

Yes.

Alderwoman, you may proceed.

Thank you. Alderman, so the bill that you have before you now is just fresh out of committee. Is that correct?

This is just out of committee, yes, ma'am.

And so it hasn't been to ENA yet, right?

This one has not been to ENA yet. I mean, the recommendations, I'm sorry, the recommendations have been to ENA, but yes, go ahead.

So did they vote on this particular version of what you have in your hand?

Yes, they approved these amendments.

So they approved the amendments already?

Sorry, they approved the recommendations from the Board of Budget Committee, and then they added some changes as well.

Okay, which is reflected in the board bill that you carry where they added changes.

Correct.

Okay, and what changes? I'm sorry, you may have said that I don't remember. What changes did they add?

Well, I'll do it one more time. So they added the budget committee changes that we recommended Forestry Department to Urban Foresters, CJC Project Manager, Building Division 1, Building Division 2, Building Division 1 Environmental Health Specialist, Fire Department. Tech and secretary position, full-time, reduced and part-time. They restored the cuts from the street department. Equipment services division, they restored two of those cuts. Personal services, they added $750,000 to right to counsel. They fixed the errors that was made in the bill division to correct the prop ANS personal schedule. The mailroom, they added non-personal support accounts. Our ward capital is now attached in the budget, provides the project details by ward. Each ward, they did the park ranger saving. The airport had an error of $1.3 million that they over-accounted for in their budget. They had to get pulled out. The changes, a million dollars from the police judgment settlement. And then that goes into the fire department as well as a four hundred forty six thousand to the fire department for the GMT fund equipments to also.

Excuse me, can I cut in for a minute? I just wanted to know what did ENA add anymore?

Oh, yes. Sorry about that. And they added all the – so they added – they fixed the errors in the building division, the mailroom, the airport savings fund. They also did the – they added the million-dollar judgment cut. They added the cut to fire department GMT so that they could go into the parity. They added the $1 million to the fire department. They added some forestry personal services, additional savings that was needed to be added to the budget because there was additional money that was taken out. The pay raise, so I think that is in question for the sheriff's department. We do have that board bill to be able to give our sheriffs a raise. They added that pay adjustment for the pay plan. Yes, ma'am. And security contracts for the recreation department and some savings for the park rangers they added.

Okay. And so I know you haven't been here very long, but you are aware that we can have supplemental appropriations and changes in the board bills, right?

There can be a supplemental budget, yes.

Correct. So if we pass the budget as a way of a protest or just to say you do not get to tell us what to do, we could come back and put in those very important things that we may need to do later. Is that correct?

That is correct, but if you're saying just to protest, the reality is if we don't pass this budget, 23% is state law, and the raise for the police officer is going to happen regardless. So you can say no, but it's happening regardless. of protests. And I've done many a protest. And I would think that would be a silly one because the reality is, is I am upset.

Because you don't know as much as I do about the budget because you haven't been here. So I was going to get to that. You went way off instead of let me ask my next questions. OK, because I'll get to that. So they're going to be the reality is that they're going to get a race irrespective. Right.

Period. Period.

Right. Because they already have the money, right? Is that correct?

Correct.

Okay. So, and did anything prevent us from taking money out of the police budget? Because we already did take it out of the money that they used to pay settlements, right?

We did take money out the police budget with this budget bill.

Okay. So what would happen if they didn't have enough money in the police budget for their race?

I'm assuming if they didn't have enough money, they would probably try to skirt around and say state statute that we have to do a board bill because if we don't, we're impeding the ability to do their job, which is also in the state control.

We did do a board bill. We just didn't. We also, do you believe that we each as individual aldermen have the right to vote our conscience and for what is in the best interest of our community?

I think we do that all the time, Alderman Tyus.

Right. So then how do they make you and I or anybody else vote a certain way? They can't. I can tell you that right now. They will not be able to force us to vote. So just because the mayor submits a bill does not mean the mayor gets the bill. I've been here when the mayor's bill was held and with a do not pass. I've been here for a long, long time. And the Board of Aldermen went and did another bill. So what would happen if we voted no and they didn't have enough money in their budget? They would have to take us to court, right?

Hypothetically, maybe so, but you have the right to vote how you want to vote. Yes, you can vote no.

Yeah, right. And if they take me into court and say, Alderman Titus, you voted no, I'll say, yes, I did. And I've been voting no for a lot of years because you can't tell me how to vote, which is the other thing that other aldermen can do. You cannot tell the alderman how to vote. So I always wondered how they were going to make us do this because our charter kind of has a check and balance on things. The mayor can submit a bill. And if the mayor doesn't, our charter says that if the mayor doesn't submit it in time, then Paul Payne or whoever the budget director is, uh budget goes into effect so i don't know if you know that but whether the mayor does a bill or not the budget director has to have one prepared in case the mayor doesn't submit one but we have a check and balance this is the legislative check and balance to say no we're not going to do that now i just want to imagine how if the majority of the board of aldermen says no how will they make us do what we have a right not to do if we don't want to See, I think we've given up really easy is what I'm saying. That we didn't look at that this really is a fight. And this is a fight for our city's right. And maybe people don't want to do this this time. But we really need to look at long term. They cannot make us vote for a bill. We can do supplemental. We can do supplemental and bring in what we need to do. But to just give in and say, yes. we're going to go along with this at all costs is a mistake to me. Okay. Because people get real comfortable and going along with things that are wrong. So if we can do supplementals, if they can't force us to do a bill, if in fact, when we cut things out of the way our chart is written, if we cut something out at the board of Alderman, they can't put it back in that. That's what you, you know, that, right. Are you aware of that?

Yep. I'm aware of that.

Okay, so I don't think it's foolish, silly or anything else. I think that you have to think long-term. I think that you have to think about getting rid of the police force and making a joint police force with somebody else so we don't have a safe little city police force. We have to not put our city in financial bond where we can't give services because there is somebody that is forcing us to do something that is absolutely not in the best interest of our community. And again, this is for somebody that stood on this floor and has supported the police, want them to have money, want them to have raises. But I do not support the police board in doing this. I do not support the state government in doing this. And I think if the federal government came into the state of Missouri and said, this is what you have to do, they would be ready to call out the Missouri National Guard to say this is not going to happen. So I think we're making a mistake to go along with it. And I think there's other ways to do it, to go around it. And we just didn't explore it enough. And I think that we also got to look at this amendment about parity because that was an amendment to the to the charter. So we also need to look at why we have an amendment about parity. of of what uh the uh white shirts make and we also got to look at an amendment about what the white shirts make in the police much less the fire department we start to now this is going to make people who i never was for to fund the police i always said oh just like you oh that's silly no you shouldn't say that but when the police start to be uh in charge of the city i'm never ever ever for the police being in charge of the city. And I actually passed a resolution full and everybody in the board who were 28 signed on to when they marched in the streets and mocked the protesters about whose streets are streets. I actually passed a resolution and the board went with it that said that the police had no business doing that. This is not a police state and they should not be mocking protesters and people because this is not their city. This is the city's citizen city. So I think we are just taking, we're going along with it too much. And so I don't think that we have to do this. I understand why you might want it, but we can always make those changes later. And if everybody vote present, what are they gonna do with that? All these things, there's other things we can do as members of the Board of Aldermen to show our total disgust for what's being done. I was already going to vote no now. I'm going to vote no with pleasure now. I'm going to ask, make sure that there's a roll call because this should not occur. Thank you very much.

Any further discussion? Any further discussion? No. Alderman from the 14th, you are, sorry, is Alderman from the 7th? Sorry. Alderwoman from the 7th, you're recognized.

Thank you, Madam President, members of the board. I just, obviously there's a lot happening right now. I just wanted to make sure, again, that what I put on the record was what we did today in the budget committee. I just want to be very clear on what we are actually voting on. In the budget committee, we are actually, what we voted on, the thing, the difference in the budget before and the budget now, is that there is a million dollars that is being moved from the SLMPD budget line item to go to firefighters for the sake of parity. I just want to make sure that we're being very clear that the budget that the Board of Aldermen is voting on in front of us, we are not increasing the police's budget. I think all of us have been very vocal about our strong feelings of opposition. I went to the police board of commissioners and vocally testified that i was in opposition so i want to make sure that's on the record but what we're talking about today is making sure that we are honoring our parity guidelines and also the park rangers i definitely have to uplift it's really important for our city that there is 383 000 in this budget for park rangers that will be allowed to be contracted out to account for them not having the staff to do it that's also been a regular conversation at the police commissioners But I just want to make sure for the public, for folks that are watching at home, that this is not the Board of Aldermen doing anything beyond what we believe we are legally obligated to do and making sure that we are honoring our parity, which requires that we make sure that our firefighters are getting the same as SLMPD, that that is the big change in this budget. And I also just want to make sure that I went on the record and thank the mayor, the president of the Board of Aldermen, and the comptroller for taking the additions that the budget committee proposed, which was a health environmental officer for the data center that we're going to be discussing regulations for, which is building inspectors so that we can do strategic code enforcement, a number of changes for firefighters, and some things for forestry. So I want to be clear about what is in the budget for us today and that the Board of Aldermen and I think ENA have actually played pretty well together with The problem is we have this other entity that is making decisions on a city budget. But what we are voting on today keeps us in compliance and it keeps us honoring state statutes. And it's actually moving a million dollars out of the line item. So I just want to make sure that we're clear on the record about the vote that's taking place today. Thank you.

Any further discussion? Any further discussion? Okay. Seeing none, Alderman from the 14th, you are recognized to close.

Thank you, Madam President, members of the board. One, I do appreciate all the conversation and dialogue that has taken place today. Like I say, there's a lot of bills that we do at this board of aldermen. I would say this is probably one of the most important ones that we have to do is to approve a budget from this Board of Aldermen by July 1st so that it does go into effect. I do want to piggyback and be very clear. I think I've said it. This whole fight with being upset with the police board on the decisions they made, understood. I think as a chair, I led the charge with the support of my committee to make sure that they were subpoenaed to come in. I reached out to them multiple times to come in to present their budget to the police. It didn't happen. But let's talk about what is facts and what is moving forward over just rhetoric or a waste of a protest vote. Twenty-three percent, which is state statute, which was passed by the general municipal assembly, senators and representatives, that is going to happen regardless. Twenty-three percent is going to happen this year with or without the budget. 24% is going to happen this or next year with or without the budget. 25% is going to happen in two years with or without a budget. That is the fact. And yes, if we don't like it, we can get petitions to be able to put it back on the ballot. But as of today, June the 22nd, I have not heard of anybody collecting signatures to remove this to make it back local control, which I would love. But we have an obligation right now to do our job and to get a budget out. Also, if we do not get this budget out, what's going to happen regardless is the police race is going to go into effect regardless. The police department, board of commissioners have the ability to vote on things that we all do not like that is outside the purview of the Board of Aldermen, the Mayor, the Comptroller, and the President. That's why there are legal litigations going on. But I want to focus in on what is in this budget and why it is important not only to send a clear message that the Board of Aldermen is passing a budget for our credit rating agencies, but also for our departments that are looking forward to some of these positions that they have advocated for, also to make sure that we actually have a balanced budget and not letting one entity allow us to get so worked up that we're going to vote no on the budget because of the raises and the percentage that's already going into effect. Let's also send a message to our fire department that we also support them getting a raise per parity that we have to do per charter. There are so many improvements that, you know, I'm proud of this budget committee has made from our building division to our street department. to put more money into Right to Counsel. There's so many changes that we've made to make sure that there's no errors in the budget, to make sure a budget that comes out is actually a clean budget. And I want to give a thank you to Paul Payne, a budget director who has been challenged this year to try to figure out how to do such a tough budget in a year where the police department has this new state control. I'm asking my colleagues to vote yes on this budget because we also have an obligation to get a budget done and to send it out. And I think it's a lot of great work in here, as I stated. Some of the things that was talked about today is going to happen regardless. But there's a lot of great work that has went into this budget. And with that, Madam President, I renew my motion to perfect Board Bill 1 as amended in committee.

It's been moved by the alderman from the 14th, seconded by the alderwoman from the 7th, that we perfect Board Bill 1 in committee. There's been a request for roll call. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Alderwoman Swanson.

Point of order. Point of order.

Alderwoman from the 12th, please state your point of order.

I'm sorry. It's point of information. Alderwoman Keyes has sent me something about being let back in, and I don't know if she got back in or not.

She's on. I'm back. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. Thank you so much.

Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Alderman Schweitzer.

Aye.

Alderman Odenberg.

Aye.

Alderman Cohn.

No.

Alderman Narayan. No. Alderman Devotee. No. Alderman Velazquez. Aye. Alderman Sonnier.

Aye.

Alderman Cox-Santwi.

Aye.

Alderman Browning. Aye. Alderwoman Clark Hubbard. Aye. Alderwoman Keyes.

Aye.

Alderwoman Tyus. No. Alderwoman Boyd. Aye. Alderman Aldridge.

Aye.

President Green. Aye.

Alderman Browning. Aye.

Alderman Boyd, I need you to turn your camera on. I had my camera on. We can't see you. You know what? I covered up the camera. Either turn it around so we can see.

Maybe she didn't hear you say turn it around.

Turn your camera around so we can see you. Turn your phone around so we can see your face. Thank you.

We have 10 aye votes, five no votes. By your vote, you sustain the motion from the alderman from the 14th to perfect board bill one as amended in committee. Report of engrossment.

We have none.

We can dispense with line item 18, third reading and final passage of board bills consent. We have none. We can dispense with line item 19, third reading and final passage of board bills. We have none. We can dispense with line item 20, report of the finally passed and signed by the president. We have none. In dispense with line item 21, first reading resolutions of reference to committees. We have none. In dispense with line item 22, second reading resolutions committee reports and adoption. We have none. In dispense with line item 23, courtesy resolutions. We have none. In dispense with line item 24, miscellaneous and unfinished business. We have none. In dispense with line item 25, announcements.

Monday, June 22nd, legislation and rules 230 in the Kennedy room. Tuesday. June 23rd, HUD's 11 a.m. in the Kennedy Room. Wednesday, Public Infrastructure and Utilities, 3.30 p.m. in the Kennedy Room. Thursday, June 25th, Health and Human Development, 9 a.m. webinar. And Personnel and Administration, 11 a.m. Kennedy Room. Friday, June 26th, full board meeting, 10 a.m. in the chambers.

Any further announcements? Elder Woman from the 10th. Nope. Any further announcements? Any further announcements? Seeing none, Alderwoman from the 10th, you're recognized on the motion to excuse. Thank you, Madam President, members of the board, all members present this morning.

Alderwoman from the 10th, you're recognized on the motion to adjourn. Thank you, Madam President, members of the board, I move that we adjourn until Friday, June 26, 2026, in the Board of Aldermen Chambers.

It's been moved by the Alderwoman from the 10th, seconded by the Alderman from the 14th that we adjourn until Friday, June 26, 2026 in the Board of Aldermen Chambers. All those in favor signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Opposed? Aye. Motion carries. We are adjourned.