BUDGET: City Council review starts today; District 1 Community Network gets ‘what you need to know’ briefing

Three days after Mayor Jenny Durkan presented her 2020 budget proposal, the City Council’s review and revisions start today. How can you be part of the process? The District 1 Community Network got a briefing from the city budget boss last night. Here’s what you need to know:

CITY COUNCIL REVIEW: The council’s first meeting as the Select Budget Committee starts at 2 pm today; here’s the agenda. They’ll start with an overview – here’s the slide deck for that:

Then they will launch into initial overview presentations, department by department. First up is Seattle Public Utilities (see its budget here), with this slide deck:

Then Seattle City Light (see its budget here), with this slide deck:

All this is just the first round. You can watch live via the Seattle Channel; see future agendas here. (SDOT and SPD, among others, present on Friday.)

DISTRICT 1 COMMUNITY NETWORK: The city budget director, Ben Noble, who will brief councilmembers this afternoon, gave a “Budget 101” to D1CN at its meeting last night. We recorded it on video:

City Councilmember Lisa Herbold was there too, as you’ll see in the video, commenting from the gallery (she was not a presenter). The council’s budget review and revision timeline (see it here) stretches over the next two months. If there is something you feel passionately about, speaking at the first major public hearing is an option – it’s on Thursday, October 3rd, 5:30 pm at City Hall downtown. In the meantime, you can email council@seattle.gov, and/or individual councilmembers – as was noted at the D1CN meeting, the more they hear about something in particular, the more it breaks through the noise. And sooner is better than later – while changes will be made throughout the two-month review, there are deadlines and cutoffs (as the timeline shows), especially for additions whose impact/funding has to be studied.

4 Replies to "BUDGET: City Council review starts today; District 1 Community Network gets 'what you need to know' briefing"

  • S - in West Seattle September 25, 2019 (3:26 pm)

    Durkan needs to go along with the City Council. I don’t see how she thinks growing the City Budget that much is even an option. 

  • MJ September 25, 2019 (5:40 pm)

    Fiscal insanity, spending needs to be reined in.  The City should be saving for a rainy day not growing more give aways.

    • AMD September 25, 2019 (6:16 pm)

      What giveaways should they trim?

  • TJ September 25, 2019 (6:03 pm)

    I’ve heard Seattle’s budget will be up 39% over 6 years ago. Boston has a population under ours yet a budget of $3.5 billion compared to 6.5 here. San Diego’s population is nearly doubles ours yet their budget is $4.3 billion. Vagrancy, property crime, and homelessness aren’t nearly the issues there compared to here. Weird so many people here are ok with their pockets being a cash register for the politicians. The budget will never be enough either being we have all crusader politicians with expensive agendas. The bubble will burst bad here soon and I can’t wait to see the fear mongering by our elected officials 

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