City budget and Measure E

“One thing that I just also wanted to, to mention both to the audience, um, as well as my colleagues is that You know, I had actually voted down this recent budget, and I, you know, want to acknowledge my own role in adding things on the floor.”

“I’m a little concerned about the ongoing impacts to the budget, um, with this level of, um, increase.”

“I hear your frustrations, but respectfully, this is under fifty million dollars we’re talking about, and we have a two billion dollar budget.”

“I’m looking at the funding table and I’m noticing that, um, the item— the half a million is coming from the general fund And then it said Project Reimagining Public Safety. So my question is, was this something that was budgeted in the, in the budget, or is this an additional allocation?”

“Like, we’re recommending let’s extend the coverage of the safety ambassadors. There may not be a number to that now, but the idea is that we would engage with staff and iterate so that at the start of the budget cycle we’d have very specific recommendations.”

“My understanding is that with this report, we know where that stands. I’ve seen a lot of reporting out there, I should say faux reporting, saying that the raises have already been awarded, that they will already eat up some portion of Measure E should it pass.”

“This may not be a short question, but what I think what I was getting at with some of the data questions and reporting stuff is that one thing I think we are looking for in the next mid-cycle budget is KPIs or KPI targets for departments, which presumably they would also report on annually.”

“I’ll also add for context, we’re in the process of drafting out a budget for how all of the Measure NN funds would be allocated to accomplish these various goals.”

“It keeps up with inflation. I think that, you know, I came in here leaning towards a 2% increase just given the general budget constraints of the city, the fact that we’re making cuts to very important services and facing an uncertain budget outlook or gloomy budget outlook in the mid-year.”

“Transitional age youth are navigating currently housing instability. Workforce barriers, safety concerns, gaps in mental health access, all of which are directly shaped by our budget priorities.”

“I have to be at home with my baby because she has a fever. Thank you, Chief Covington, for the presentation. I know there have been conversations about the overtime budget, but for the sake of the public, can you share why the overtime budget is part of the spending plan for the department?”

“To me, I think the overall budgetary situation of the city, and if all city employees are going to have to, you know, deal with some pain, hopefully not layoffs, but it feels weird to increase a salary by more than we absolutely need to.”

“Can I just respond to that please really quickly? In terms of their budget, uh, at least when it was under the SOC, technically they’re supposed to submit a spending plan at least once per year, but there were times where they went much longer than that in submitting a spending plan, and it was an issue.”

“This is something that we know that Oakland constituents feel safer with, knowing that the interactions are recorded, compared to the drone, which is something that we haven’t implemented here, we don’t know the actual implications. Would there be a possibility of potentially rearranging the, the order or priority of the expenditures in this next year of the budget cycle?”