City Council Budget Work Session

meeting

Austin City Council 4h 51m 2 speakers 8 agenda items transcribed 8 days ago official recording ↗

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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.

What agenda items and schedule does the council set at the beginning of the meeting?

Brian McGivern 0:09

You're watching a meeting of the Austin City Council with Mayor Kirk Watson,

Zenobia Joseph 0:17

Mayor Pro Tem Cheeto Vela, Council Members Natasha Harper-Madison,

Brian McGivern 0:23

Vanessa Fuentes, Jose Velasquez, Ryan Alter, Krista Lane, Mike Siegel, Paige Ellis. Zoe Khadri. Mark Duchin. City Attorney Deborah Thomas. City Clerk Erica Brady. And City Manager T.C. Brodnax.

Kirk Watson 1:01

Good morning, everybody. It's 10 o'clock in the morning on August 6, 2026. I'll call to order the City Council meeting of the Austin City Council. We have a quorum of the City Council present, and we are meeting in City Council Chambers located at City Hall at 301 West 2nd Street in Austin, Texas. Members, we have a number of items on the agenda today. What I intend to do is And by the way, yes, there's a new proposed amendment that I'm seeking co-sponsors. I call this the whatever it takes amendment. Yeah, and we take money from wherever we can, including if it wipes out most of our other proposed amendments, so we can do that. Anyway. Having said that, what we'll do is we'll go in the order of the agenda, except when we get to items two and four.

Kirk Watson 1:56

As I put on the message board yesterday, items two and four might very well – I want to get a feeling from the council about how we want to do that before we take the amendment. And we might take up four before we take up two or two before we take up four because that deals with the ordering of the items on the agenda. But we'll talk about that in more detail when we get there. As I always do, I want to point out what our schedule is. Today, of course, we have this budget work session. We have the other agenda items. And then on Wednesday, August 12th, We will be scheduled to have the first opportunity to vote on the budget Thursday, August 13th, and Friday, August 14th. We will also conduct public hearing and have council discussion and the council vote on those days.

Kirk Watson 2:47

I just want to make sure that everybody's aware of what the schedule is. Having said that, let us now go to item number one. which is posted as a presentation and discussion of the city manager's fiscal year 2026-2027 proposed budget. And we will start with speakers, and I'll turn to the city clerk. When the city clerk calls your names, many of you have already been here and know how this operates, but let me say it again, and for those that are new. She'll call out the names in batches of three, four, five, maybe more. When your name is called, please come forward when your name is called and go ahead and take a seat if a seat's available. If a seat's not available at the desk, take one of these front row seats, and that way we'll know you're here and we can efficiently hear your testimony.

Kirk Watson 3:31

So with that, I'll turn to the city clerk.

Erica Brady 3:33

Thank you, Mayor. I have a few remote speakers for item one. Catherine McArdle.

Catherine McArdle 3:41

Good morning. My name is Catherine McArdle. I live in District 9, and I'm here today to again ask you to keep the police budget flat. Do not give APD a penny more than required by that ridiculous Texas law. No excuses about the cost of that new police union contract some of you voted for in 2024. Find other ways to cut APD's budget down to the minimum required. It can be done if you all have the courage and the backbone to do it, especially in the wake of yet another police killing. Do not reward them for that. I'm glad that there has been some discussion on using new property tax revenue to fund social services contracts. Thank you for this initial effort. However, even if it becomes reality, it is not enough.

Catherine McArdle 4:20

It is not enough because there is a greater need than to just maintain the existing social services contracts. We need to grow social services provision in this city. We desperately need more services to support our unhoused neighbors. We need more food access. We need more mental health support. We need more child care support. I could go on, but you already know these things, and you've been hearing for weeks from so many in the community about these needs. And it's so obvious that you could fund these needs by taking the proposed $25M increase to APD and instead providing these additional social services.