Common Council - Special Meeting

This meeting will come to order. The city clerk will call the role. Hyello Burmaster, Betar, Carone, Urban, Beatric, Wazooi, Kasimotasta, Lmetto, Jeruti, all present.

Please rise for the pledge of allegiance followed by a moment of silence for the deceased members of the county council. To the flag of the United States of America and to the rep it stands nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all. The agenda for this special meeting is to discuss the budget vote. Um there will be no public comment period. So council uh our budget amendments in committee of the hall council.

Yeah. I'm going to do the top ones. Um I make a motion to introduce ordinance seven or pull from committee. Is that 2 point? Is it the 2.5 or the five million? Oh, I didn't even start with that. We can we can do that. Uh I actually No, that's number six. We want Yes. for the bond. I'll do Yeah, sorry about that. It was ordinance six. I'll second it. Motion and second to introduce proposed ordinance number six. um

bond ordinance authorizing the issuance of 5 million serial bonds of the city of Udica, Anida County, New York to finance the cost of the street paving projects. Whereas all conditions president proceeded to the financing of the capital projects described below including compliance with the provision of the state environmental quality review act has been performed and whereas it is now desired to authorize the financing of such capital projects now therefore be resolved the common council of the city of Udica county New York as follows section section one the city of Udica county New York the city is hereby by authorized to undertake the construction, reconstruction or reservicing of highways, roads, streets, parkways, or parking areas, whether or not including sidewalks, curbs, gutters, drainage, landscaping, grading, or improving the rights of way with flexible pavement of a type described in local finance law section 11 A20C at an estimated maximum cost of $5 million. Section two, it is hereby determined that the maximum estimated cost of the class of objects or purpose of 5 million set amount is hereby appropriated therefore in the plan for the financing thereof should consist of issuance of 5 million in serial bonds of the bonds of the city which are hereby authorized to be issued pursuant to the ordinance of the provisions of the local law.

Mr. President section 16 ordinance which takes effect immediately should be published in full summary form of the city's official newspaper together with notice of the city clerk and substantially the form provided in section 8 81.0 of the federal finance law votes please.

Can I uh speak on this first one thing Mr. President? Yeah. So, I just want for the people listening so they understand this borrowing of $5 million is basically so we can send this out to bid now and not waiting until the state budget is passed. We will not be borrowing $5 million. It's more of a line of credit and um carry on till next year. This is something that the people always complain that we that we wait too long to get the p streets paved. the other CHIPS money and stuff we can't use to bid out until the state budgets passed. So, this eliminates all that and we could probably go out to bid next week with that. So, I just want everybody to know that. Okay. Thank you.

Yeah. Thank you, Councilman. Anyone else? Votes, please. Nine adopted. Mr. President, I'd like to make a motion to pull ordinance 7. So, so let me ask a quick question. So, we have ordinances number six, seven, and eight um that I'm assuming you're pulling out by based on your your Oh, are you excused because it's the two of them? So, so the only question that I have and I think that it was explained to us. We actually aren't pulling those. So, you're not pulling the inter fund transfer fund mitigation. Ordinance seven. I meant comment council salary, the one that's at the top of the packet. I was just going through that. Okay. So, you want to start with that one first? Okay. All right.

Sorry about that. I know we have it's a ordinance 7 from uh date 3426 common council salary. We're switching it from the person from the common council department to the clerk's department. Okay, I have a second. Second order. I'm sorry.

Proposed ordinance number seven common council changes in 2026 27 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore be ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Common council account A510-101 salary $254,210 to $26,735 a negative 47,475 change votes please.

Nine is adopted. Make a motion to pull ordinance 8 from 34 2026. I have a second, please. Second. Thank you. Okay. Proposed ordinance number eight, common council changes in 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore, be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. City clerk account A51410-101. Salaries $244,720 to $292,195. A positive $47,475 change. Votes, please.

Nine is adopted. Make a motion to pull ordinance 9 from 3426. Second, please. Second. Proposed ordinance number nine, common council changes 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Common council um social security from $19,447 to $17,959 a negative $1,488 change. Votes please. Nine is adopted. I make a motion to pull ordinance 10 from 3426 out of committee.

Thank you. Proposed ordinance number 10 common council changes 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore be ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. city clerk social security from $19,945 to $21,433. A positive $1,488 change. Votes, please. Nine adopted. I'd like to make a motion to pull Ordinance 12 out of committee. Ordinance 12. Yes. And then make a I have a motion to make an amendment once we get it out. I think we need a second

all the way. uh from March 11th, 2026, the capital outlay for paving, but we got to amend it. All right. So So before we jump into any of that, I I really kind of got to go through what budget amendments you're actually pulling out. Okay. We can do actually because that that's got to make sense to me in in every other component. Let's do your uh Yeah, I you want to go in order? Well, the only reason why I'm asking because again it was explained to us by the budget director that if you're going to take out of building transfers from building alterations, you're going to take out transfers from paving them out. What's that? We're not taking those out. We're going to dispense those. Do you want to go through them in order? That kind of didn't make sense in what you just explained to me. Councilman, go in order. You want to just go in order and then we could we're either discharging or

you kind of just need to explain to me like from start to finish what's going on. Well, I think we'll just do one at a time. No, Jack, because the reason No, it's not wasting time because again, if you're taking money out of the actual reserves, it's in the it's in the actual budget. So, your budget like, let me finish talking. No, excuse me. I'm not. Hang on, please. I'm asking very politely. I have not raised my voice. I generally am concerned that if you do take money out of those lines that we have to make sure that the money that's budgeted for also has an amendment so that the budget's not incorrect. So, one of Hang on. Why don't we just go in order and explain your reasoning? Yeah. So, we could either vote or discharge. We'll go in order.

I don't I don't like I said I thought you explained it a different way of what was what was going on. One of the things we're looking at is uh ordinances six through through So, why don't we start with six, right? Right. But they're all going to be the same situation. 6 through 11, we have no intentions of passing. And those are we're going to leave the restricted funds in place as the mayor and everybody said. And then also the HSAs and HAS we're not going to pass. We're going to leave those. So nine. So I don't have So six, seven. So that's inter fund transfers for flood mitigation. What number is that? Six. 6 7 8 9 10. Those are the inter fund transfers. Yep. So you're pulling those? Yep. Pulling those. Okay. Yep. We're not We're leaving nine and then 9 10 and 11

11 12 No, we're voting on 12. So then the anything that says HSA or HA, we're we're getting rid of that. We're just going to leave it as is in the budget. Okay. So then we're going to skip 12. 7 8 9 10 11 18 19 and 20. We'll be voting on 12 through 23. We'll be making an amendment on Well, 12. Hold on. Hold on. Let's I think we should go one at a time. Yeah, one person at a time. Go ahead. So, from here on out, do you want I I think we should just go one at a time to make this easier. Uh without pulling them out. So, explain those. So, number number six, I'd move to discharge that. You can vote in a block to vote discharge 6 through 12.

If if you think that's going to be 11 or 6 through 11 is discharge, you take those out of the pack. Discharge 6 through 11. Second. Motion second. 67 8 9 10 and 11. Move to discharge. Anyone want to follow? Second. You want to do cattle out the paving? Okay. Okay. So, now we're at 12. We're at 12. Can we skip 12 and go to 13? Wait. So, let's just Can we just finish this really quick? Do we have to discharge anything else from 14, 15, 16? Um, it was going to be 18, 19, and 20. Holiday pay and sidewalks were discharging. So, yeah, they are. So, so you're taking out 18, 19, and 20. 18, 19, and 20. and 20.

Make a motion to discharge 1819 19 and 20. I'll second it. Anyone opposed? 1819 and 20 are discharged. So for this to work, we were going to amend our street paving to $500,000. So that's the capital outlay. Yep. And I also have to amend it. So it's a it's actually in the budget. So, so here's here's the one problem that I have is is it states that the council requests the controllers's office and the board of ENH to introduce a new account line to separate track and track this additional onetime appropriation of 1 million a paving.

So, here's the problem that I have. What you have with this ordinance, which is not an it's it's an ordinance that's passed by the legislative body, you do not have the authority to tell the board of ENA to transfer those funds. I we can amend that and take it out because the controller's office gave us the line that this can go to now. So you're changing this amendment? Yes. To what line? To street maintenance. Street paving. It's A5110441. So those aren't the same lines? No. No. It's going to now be part of our budget. So you're moving it to street maintenance, which isn't paving.

Okay. Uh, so, so my guess, my question is, and and this is this is the one thing that I'm going to ask you guys, and it's not, please stop the nons, like stop the the sidebar for a second, please. Okay? And let me ask a serious question. If you have this money and you actually want it to go to paving, my question is to Katie, to Roco, and to Frank, why would you not put that in contingency and transfer that money into the actual capital outline out capital outlay once this budget is passed so that you know that that appropriation is in that capital outlay line rather than having it in street maintenance because you're not going to pave out of street maintenance. you're going to pave out of the capital outlay line, right? And you could even take that money and do that instead of having this paving instead of having this ordinance have a contingency even if you amend it, right? Like I would be okay with that. And that's and that's something that I would support because the transfer would have to come back to the council. And this is what happens sometimes when we transfer money and things like that is that the lines do get confused. So, so if we really want to pave, I'm going to ask you, why not just keep it in contingency? But wait, listen to me. Can I finish? Why not? Why not just put that in contingency and then the board of ENA actually takes that amendment from the contingency, the $500,000, and transfer it to that capital outlay plan, which would make more sense. And that's that's all I'm saying. And that's kind of been the the start to this entire discussion of why I put that in contingency from the beginning. Go ahead.

Uh Katie, can you give me the lang number again? Uh the one that we wanted to send it to or the old one? The one that you wanted to the one that you want to revise it to? Uh street maintenance. A55110 44101. Okay. Street maintenance title street. I I know it's street maintenance is for repairs saying with the streets. I I understand. So it's okay to move $500,000 into there. They're not moving a million. So do you understand what I'm explaining to you? Explain, please. They're not moving a million. They're moving 500,000 and it's okay for street repairs. That is an okay um amendment if you would like to do it. Samantha, I'm well aware, but don't we want it to be actually in the paving plan? It is. It's going right to the paving. It does not. The street maintenance is not part of paving. That's part of repairs, Frank. And it's actually in the budget. Go ahead.

Yeah. Make We have the votes to move. Yes. So like So nobody's going to answer my question why you wouldn't just do it the right way to begin with. That makes sense. Um $200,000 instead of a million. But that's and they're moving it. Listen, if you know that's why you guys have your votes. If you don't agree with it, then you

I mean, with all due respect, though, we're sitting here. We're We just have a motion in a second. Roco, I'm sorry that you weren't here last night, but if you went and understood that we transferred money out of lines and they were taking money out of out of overtime lines and salary lines to pay for lines and they had amendments to $17,000 taking out of that lines. I'm just asking why aren't you doing it the right way to begin with? Okay, but that's what I'm saying. Like it's common sense, but you're your amendment says that the So now you have to introduce the actual amendment because you can't change the account number. It's a whole new ordinance council. So, you have to introduce a new amendment. You have to You cannot amendment. You cannot amend an ordinance.

Somebody can challenge this legally if they want to after. But can we There's no way that you can amend an ordinance to say a totally different thing. If I wanted to submit an ordinance for the general fund contingency and I said, "You want to know what? I'm going to make an amendment to salary lines for the police department." You're telling me that that's okay? It's the same intent. It's not. It's not the same intent because one comes out of the capital outlay which is a restricted fund and the other one comes out of the general fund. I'm gonna make a motion to amend ordinance 12. I mean you got to be the amendment is going to say department bureau street maintenance account number 455110-44101 45. I mean this is just unbelievable. 44101. Okay. And it's account title will be street paving.

Okay. And the two will change to 500,000. the [snorts] change will be 500,000 in the rational you can just end it to say allocate an additional 500,000 to paving roads so you're changing an entire ordinance it's still the same intent of the we want to send to paving your same intent is to take it out of a restricted fund that is the amendment if there's the account number is not even the same so we got to vote on it so just Mr. President second Mr. President, I apologize. Just to summarize, so we're moving this from $1 million to $500,000 in the street maintenance line for paving for street paving. So you're taking a restricted account and you're moving it to a couple general fund.

Yeah. So we're going to amend. So yep, we're just have the votes on amendment intent of the amendment. Holy cow. I've never seen anything like this in 14 years. Six yays amended. Motion to vote. Yeah. For um common council changes 2026 20227 ENA approved annual estimate street paving account 4551104101 um from to 500,000 to change 500.

Yeah. Change $500,000. Votes, please. Six years adopted. Make a motion to introduce ordinance 13.

Okay. I have a second. Okay. Common council changes 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Fire line account 853412-21301 safety gear from $100,000 to $175. A positive change of $75,000. Your votes, please.

I like to qualify my vote here. Yes. So, uh, anybody who knows me, I've been on this um common council for eight years. I've always supported our police and fire to the extreme and I still do. The only reason I am not supporting this is the mayor has already came out and said he was giving this money out of CBDG money and all you people sitting around this council were ready to cut this line and you cut it last year until one of us made a comment that caused an uproar. So to me, that's the only reason I'm doing that. the money would have been there and um now we're we're expending money that we shouldn't be spending for that because it was already covered. Thank you.

Thank you. So So you voted no on this, right? Let's make that because we're using votes, please. We got 72. I'd make a motion to pull ordinance 14 from committee. Yep. Proposed ordinance number 14. Need a second, please.

Thank you. Common council changes in 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Parks maintenance account A57110-441 contracted services 145,000 to $200,000 a positive $55,000 change. Votes, please. Nine is adopted. Make a motion to pull ordinance 15 from committee. Second. Second. Thank you.

Common council changes 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore, be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Budget account A51340-102. wages 35,000 to zero. So a negative $35,000 change. Votes, please. 6 adopted. Make a motion to pull ordinance 16 from committee.

Second. Thank you. Common council changes 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore be ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. engineering account A51-440-411 contractual 811 from 225,000 to $190,000 a negative $35,000 change votes please six adopted make a motion to app ordinance 17 from committee second

common council changes 202627 ENA approved annual estimate Now therefore be ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Engineering account A51440-441 contracted services $87,500 to $45,500 a negative $42,000 change votes please. Mr. President, yes. I would just ask that they change the rationale because I mean your your tax levy is already at zero based on the amendments that we passed yesterday. You would actually be lowering.

Can we have a motion and a second to amend? What's the amendment? Sam the amendment. I don't It's not my amendment. Well, you I'm not changing it. So if you want to you have to make the motion. Yeah. There's no second. Okay.

I'm voting no on these because I asked for an explanation how they got their numbers. I was never given a reason and why. So that's why I'm voting no. Okay, thank you. Make a motion to pull ordinance 21 from committee. 21. Yes. Second. Common council changes 2026 27 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore, be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Street lighting account 855182-211 capital outlay from 30,000 to zero. a negative $30,000 change.

Mr. President, I just I just want to state for the record that the city of Utica just settled the contract with CSEA to the tune of $660,000 out of our budget. These are taking away from from that. So again, we're at a 0%. We've got that money that we put back in reserves. We just borrowed we just borrowed $5 million. This is street. Okay. And we're still It goes back to all your amendments. Okay. Okay. And you're still you still just ratified a contract. Did you Did you Did you ratify a contract on C? Did you? Yeah, I know. I'm qualifying my vote. Did you ratify a contract for CSEA? Yes. What was the amount this year? It's going to be 187,000.

Oh, 660,000 on all we we we have 550,000 left. I wanted I wanted I wanted to state that. I wanted to state I wanted to state that for the record. That amount that was just stated it's still my floor, Mr. President, that's all I wanted to say. I wanted to finish gratifying my vote. So, I appreciate that. Thank you for allowing me to to state that. You got your votes, please. 6 years adopted. Make a motion to pull 22 from committee. Second, please. Second.

Common council changes 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Street lighting account 855182-422 electric from 1,225,000 to1,80,000 a negative $45,000 change votes please. Okay. Oh, thanks. 6J's adopted. Make a motion to pull ordinance 23 from committee. Second. Second.

Thank you. County Council changes 2026 2027 ENA approved annual estimate. Now therefore, be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. Infrastructure account A57130-461 repairs 275,000 to 200,000 a negative $75,000 change votes please like to make a motion adopted I'm sorry I'd like to make a motion to pull ordinance three from committee and then I'll have an amendment

the contingency line Ordinance 3 from 34 2026. Yep. Okay. Uh common council changes 2000. Make a motion to amend. Oh, okay. Uh second. Uh the amendment is the two line to169,668 and the change line is an increase of $337342. 337 342 37 342 and the two line is again

one69 66896 88 668 668 66 668 for lunch we had a caucus and we had a good time Yep. It's so we're increasing the change is going to be 337 342 and it's going to increase the two line to be 1069 668.

Yep. We vote on the amendments. Yeah. Can we have a vote on the amendments? [clears throat] This is this is to to amend to amend. You want me to repeat the number? I need four and five. Four and five. Clear. I'll clear the board. We'll vote. Frank eight years amended.

Okay. Um common council changes 2026 2027 ENA approved estimate. Now therefore be it ordained that the annual estimate is hereby amended as follows. General fund contingency account A59999-999 contingency account from 732,000 to 32732,326 to1,69,000 um69688,000 change $88 change 337,42 342 votes Please.

Seven adopted. Make a motion to pull ordinance one from committee. Second. This is the annual estimate. Yep. And the do I amend it to fill in? So I'm read. Yep. I'm under the assumption that the council wants to keep the tax to zero increase this year. Is that correct?

I just I just want to state for the record, Mr. President, may have the point. So again, you know, we we we were very fortunate enough to to receive $3.6 million from the governor's office. Um we were fortunate enough to be able to pay back $2.1 million. You just settled the contract with CSEA. Um you [clears throat] the total contract was 66,000 because you have retroactive pay. You also have two contracts that aren't settled. Again, this is like a repeat of 2022. Majority of you were sitting here on the council and we actually voted for that. Um UFO continues to set the city up for failure. So I I just in in good conscience and understanding of how budgets actually work, I just I can't support it. So good for you to get to zero, but let's see how next year it works out for us. What's that number,

Mr. President? Mr. President, can I quote my vote also? I just want Okay, go on. Go on, controller. Yeah, go ahead. Control, you got red on the number for the annual estimate 36,194, 400. That yields to a 0% tax increase this year. Repeat it one more time. 36,194,400. That yields to a zero% tax increase this year. Well done, council. Just just for the record, I appreciate that the council allows the controversy. Really, but not the mayor. So, Mr. President,

I'm let me read it and then you quantify in front of me. That's why that's okay. Read it and I'll listen. Proposed ordinance number one, annual estimate 2026 2027. Wait, excuse me. What wasn't the controller supposed to give us a number? He did. We asked him to. So I mean we he just didn't barge in. Yeah. No. Okay. I asked the mayor to speak. All right. I just want to make that point.

Let me read it please. Who laughs last guys? Guys, be it ordained that the annual estimate for 2026 2027 fiscal year submitted by the board of estimate and aortionment of the estimated revenues and expenditures of the city for the fiscal year including the revenues which is which in the judgment of the board of estimate and aortionment will be received during the year of the mount of the sinking fund available for paying indebtedness and of the unexpended balance and also being an estimate of the expenditures which the board of estimate and enforcement deems necessary to provide for the expense of conducting the business of the city in each board bureau, department and office thereof and of the various purpose contemplated by the law and to pay the principle and the interest of the bond and indeness falling due in the community development block grant program. B and the same hereby is approved and adopted and approves the submission of the 2026 20227 51st 52nd year entitlement community development block grant program as presented authorizes the mayor to take all actions necessary for the implementation of the program. The items and sums enumerated in all the columns except the column labeled approved by estimate and aortionment of the annual estimates are in the nature of estimates and are not be considered as appropriations. they being employed for the guidance of the office, bureau and department heads. With the exception of these particular items and some more spec um specifically identified in addendum A attached here to and made part hereof, the several items and some stated in the column labeled approved by ENA of the set annual estimate and the estimated expenditures are hereby

appropriated in the amounts and for the several offices, bureaus, departments and purposes therein specified for the 2026 2027 fiscal year. Those particular items and sums particularly set forth in the addendum A are not appropriated in the sum specified in the annual estimate for the 2026 2027 fiscal year as submitted by the board of estimate and aortionment but are hereby appropriated in the amounts particularly set forth in the set addendum A. the several sums enumerated in the annual estimate and the several items and sums therefore modified as specified in addendum A as estimated revenues and the monies to be raised by taxation. In addition, thereto contained in the annual estimate and addendum A, to pay the expense of conducting the business of the city, and for the purpose contemplated by law and hereby appropriated and shall become applicable in the amount of annual estimated as modified by addendum A for the purpose of the meeting said appropriations. The amount $36,94,400 as set forth specified in the said annual estimate as modified by addendum A is hereby determined to be the tax budget to be raised by general city tax for the 2026 2000 fiscal year 27 fiscal year. Votes, please.

And if we can, Mr. President, may I qualify my vote? Yes. Go ahead. Voting for this budget because it's a 0% tax increase. We reduced our fund balance draw from over $2 million to $0. The citizens get an extra $500,000 in paving and there's an extra $337,000 going into the contingency fund. I think overall this is a very good balance. That's why I'm voting in favor of it. Thank you. I'd like to go ahead by the way. Go ahead. Go ahead. Councilman tell

everybody Okay. First of [clears throat] all, I'm very very happy for the taxpayers that we have a 0% uh tax increase. However, there was two proposals on the on the table. We could have had a 0% tax increase without cutting anything and put money in our contingency fund for three contracts that need to be solved. Secondly, you guys are handcuffing the administration on a lot of stuff. Street lighting, drive around the streets. The street lights are out all the time. I get three or four calls all the time. There's safety gear. We're adding 75,000 to a sa to a budget because somebody made a comment. Okay, which is ridiculous. Uh electric. Okay, we're cutting $45,000 from an electric line. So, the bottom line here is we nickeled and we could have had a zero either way with all these services, but we nickeled and dimed it. Do you know why? Cuz we want to handcuff the mayor. Okay, I sat on this ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch for four years the way I told Mr. Miola before he was over there when the mayor came down with a 0% tax increase. You guys all turned your heads. You never put an amendment in and you did what you had to do. So I hope everybody's happy now. We handcuffed the mayor. Okay, but we'll survive because you know what? He took over the mess that the Democrats left him. And in two years, you've seen the guy from the the uh the bond rating company and where we've gone. So, I hope you guys are all happy about everything you did and we should be happy because you got it at zero. But remember, you could have had you could have had it at zero without cutting anything from anybody. So, I will be voting no on that for that simple principle. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilman. Councilman. Uh, we'll go. Uh, it's okay. Councilman Carone. I am also going to vote no. I'm glad that we got it down to zero. I don't like the way we got it down to zero. I think there was a better option on the table to get it to zero. And I really didn't like the way the whole process went. We had members of this council blatantly telling other people how to make their vote, which is disgusting to me. blatantly without hiding it, telling somebody next to him how to vote, which is terrible. So, I'm going to vote no. I'm glad it's zero. We could added zero the other way. Thank you, Council Personnel.

Thank you, Mr. President. I am voting for this budget for a lot of reasons. Uh I think there's a lot of people applying political intent and thinking we're out to get the mayor. I I'm not out to get the mayor. I I'm here for the taxpayers. And I think proof of that is the fact that we came in, you know, we've dispensed nine amendments. We were accused of not wanting to work with each other with anybody. We dispensed over nine amendments totaling about $2.4 million. Those are the compromises we brought forward. Yes. Uh a lot of people in this room didn't get everything they want, but neither did we. And I think that this is a good reflection of uh I think it's a good budget for the city right now. I there's improvements I wish we had, but the votes weren't there. And I again, it's not about any cuts we made also was meant to still leave some wiggle room for people uh for those departments. It's we didn't cut into anybody's contracts. We didn't cut into in fact, we we funded the contingency line even more than what came down to us. And yeah, I just would appreciate for once if you know we did make a lot of compromises and that's never recognized and I just wanted it on the record because sometimes it sounds like that's not what we do. Thank you.

M I'd like the floor please. Yes.

So the reason that $2.4 million in amendments had to be dismissed was because they were totally inaccurate and they would have put the city in a bigger deficit than what they are. So the $700,000 of the healthcare lines that they wanted to take away needed to be taken away because those budget those were budget items that need to be in the budget. They wanted to take away holiday pay which needed to be budgeted. So all those amendments were dismissed not because of the due diligence of the majority that had their names on it. It was because we sat there and proved to you how wrong you were. and and time and time again from last budget, from the previous budget, and the budget before. This is a sham. And the reason why it's a sham is because the members on the board of ENA know that they just settled the contract with CSEA. You have retroactive pay. This is just CSEA that just settled, which is $660,000. So, they will tell you that they brought that down to a 0% tax increase. Okay? by next year. Already we're starting off the budget $667,000 in the hole because you didn't appropriate enough money for that. In addition to the fact that while I'm happy that we paid down debt service, right? But let's face it, if we didn't get that money and additional state aid from the governor, we would be $2.1 million in the hole to start off because we're using that out of fund balance. So, I did vote for those amendments and I'm very proud to say that that's one thing that I think we all agreed on is that we had to transfer those funds in order not to borrow money out of our account to supplement our budget like we have for the past three years. In 200 I think it was 19, 2018, 2017, one of those years, I get asked for an amendment to be put into committee and it was a $600,000 amendment to not lower taxes. So if you went from I think it was 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025, if you multiply 6* 5, what does that get you? Think about that. That's how much $600,000 a year we took out of the actual fund balance to draw down. And we

had to raise taxes what? 9% from the previous mayor who was done with his term. You had the auditors sit here and tell you that the city's not in a good financial position compared to what they were before. We are running an $880,000 deficit as of this year. Okay? So, putting that money into contingency doesn't help us knowing that we're already spending 660 $660,000 on a contract to settle. So to to make it look like the city's saving we're we're a saving grace by putting $500,000 into a street paving line when the mayor just gave us a a a presentation and our minimum paving that that the voters passed was $5 million. This year we're at $6.4 million. Okay. So that's $1.4 million over than what's the minimum of what we should spend. What this budget does is it puts the up for failure. It puts the fire department up for failure. puts the police up for failure because at the end of the day, everyone talks they love their heroes. Our heroes are the people that are on the streets, whether they're DPW, parks employees, they're they're fire and police. And guess what we did? We just shunned them by trying to make it look like we put $500,000 extra in paving. Shame on all of you because you guys have all sat here long enough to know the difference between right and wrong. I appreciate you letting me have the time, Mr. President. Thank you. Frank what? Anyone else? Votes, please.

Sorry. 6 days adopted. Motion to adjurnn. Motion to second. Ajournsel [applause] and the citizens. Oh my god.