This month, Council considered Charter Resolution 183 proposed by the Administration to change the City’s budget approval date from June 30 to June 20. The reason cited is that, in 2025, the State instituted a requirement for municipalities to set their property tax rate ‘before June 20’.
At First Hearing, I shared that, to me, our proposal was a case of ‘right problem, wrong solution’. ‘Right problem’ in the sense that we’ve rightly identified the State requirement for the City to set its property tax rate by June 20. But ‘wrong solution’ in that the Resolution proposes something different: It would move our entire budget date to June 20, instead of just the tax rate date.
So as mentioned at the time, I proposed an amendment at Second Hearing this week to rephrase the Resolution to simply mirror the State’s law – the result being that our annual budget approval date remains as it’s always been on June 30, and that we reference the State requirement which, in any event, our property tax rate is set by June 20.
Practically speaking, we usually never get that deep into June before we pass a budget anyways, but for the unusual circumstance in which it may happen, my amendment prevents us from unnecessarily losing flexibility in our budget process, while also satisfying the State’s requirement. (My general rule of thumb for legislation is always to try to keep it ‘as simple as possible’.)
In the end, my amendment received two votes and did not pass. And the unamended Charter Resolution itself received two votes and did not pass.
As mentioned during session, no further action is required since there’s no requirement to reference the State law change anyway, but I do remain open to revisit the question and collaborate on adaptations with my colleagues, and please feel free to send me your thoughts or questions as well.
