Council starts working on the Budget this week!

This week, Council will begin work on the Fiscal Year 2026 (FY26) Budget. Mayor Linda Gorton released her Proposed Budget two weeks ago, and between now and early June, Council will review it, propose any changes, and vote to approve a final version.

The first major step happens Tuesday at 1 p.m., when Council will hold a Budget Committee of the Whole (COW) meeting. During this meeting, Council will hear a presentation on the Mayor’s Proposed Budget and vote to adopt the General Fund revenue projection.

• Council must formally adopt a revenue projection before making any changes to the Budget. This vote essentially sets the maximum amount of money that can be allocated in the FY26 Budget discussions.

• The Mayor’s Proposed Budget projects $520 million in new General Fund revenue. This means Council cannot plan to spend more than $520 million as they revise the Budget.

  • You may notice that Mayor Gorton has referred to the FY26 Budget as totaling $539 million for the General Fund. Why the difference?

  • The Proposed Budget includes a little over $18 million in “pre-funding” — a budgeting strategy where money from the current fiscal year (FY25) is reserved and carried forward into FY26 for specific projects.

  • When the $18 million in pre-funding is added to the $520 million in new FY26 revenue, the full General Fund total reaches $539 million.

Council can come back later in the process and vote to adjust the revenue projection if they have additional items they want to fund that bring the Budget’s total cost higher than they originally planned (or they can lower the projection, although that is very unlikely).

• Council voted to increase the FY25 General Fund projection last year to fund several additional positions that were not included in the Mayor’s Proposed Budget.

After the Budget COW on Tuesday, Budget Links will begin meeting. There are five Budget Link groups, each with three Councilmembers, that focus on specific areas of the Budget. Each Link meets with certain LFUCG Divisions to discuss how satisfied Divisions are with their proposed funding in the Mayor’s Budget, as well as what requests the Divisions had that Mayor Gorton did not fund and why those requests are important for Council to consider supporting.

The five Budget Links are:

• Chief Administrative Officer & Housing Advocacy and Community Development: At-Large Councilmember Chuck Ellinger (Chair of the Link), District 11 Councilmember Jennifer Reynolds, and District 7 Councilmember Joseph Hale.

• Environmental Quality and Public Works: District 10 Councilmember Dave Sevigny (Chair), District 3 Councilmember Hannah LeGris, and District 6 Councilmember Denise Gray.

• Finance, Economic Development, and Planning: District 2 Councilmember Shayla Lynch (Chair), District 5 Councilmember Liz Sheehan, and District 12 Councilmember Hil Boone.

• General Government and General Services: District 9 Councilmember Whitney Baxter (Chair), At-large Councilmember James Brown, and District 4 Councilmember Emma Curtis.

• Social Services and Public Safety: Vice Mayor Dan Wu (Chair), District 1 Councilmember Tyler Morton, and District 8 Councilmember Amy Beasley.

All Link meetings are held in the Government Center’s Council Caucus Room. Link meetings are open to the public, but are not streamed online nor recorded. The two Budget Link meetings this week are:

• Environmental Quality and Public Works - Wednesday, April 30th from 9am-4pm.

• Social Services and Public Safety - Thursday, May 1st from 1:30-4:30pm.

You can learn more about the Mayor’s Proposed Budget here, and learn more in general about the City Budget here!