2020/04/22 Council Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

• April 22, 2020 federal funding that is currently available is limited to jurisdictions of 500,000 or more and must be related to COVID-19 related expenses. City Attorney Hall confirmed that actions taken today cannot legally bind decisions about next year's budget. Moved by Council Member Murphy, seconded by Council Member Stonecipher, to table action on Council Bill 2003-16 until April 29, 2020, to allow time for public input and additional questions and comment. Council Member Moore echoed other's comments regarding the sadness and gravity of the decisions before the Council today. He urged council members not to delay action because many of the program activities won't happen anyway this year due to COVID-19 restrictions. Council Member Moore asked for a commitment to look for ways to bring these programs back in the future. Council Member Roberts inquired about the new COVID-19 amendments and the discussion that occurred about the tradeoffs between the decision to look at an • 18-month period of time rather than action for the remainder of 2020. He agreed with the need to take action sooner rather than later, that there will additional actions taken, and there will be time for ongoing dialogue with citizens and the broader community in the future. Nick Harper, Administration, stated that an action today simply relates to the remainder of 2020,and that any actual action impacting the 2021 budget will need to occur later this year. He added that Administration chose to present a recommendation for 18-months for the purpose of transparency, and it is believed that taking action only for the remainder of 2020 will not be adequate. Mayor Franklin added that the reason for the 18-month is not just for the immediate savings, but for the future savings in 2021, which will be needed to weather the storm. President Tuohy agreed that these are very challenging times. She stated the City needs to be dedicated to working on bringing these programs back in the future, • 124