Residents press Westfield council for budget transparency; raise concerns about council retirement benefits

Several residents used the public-comment period at the Oct. 13 Westfield City Council meeting to press for more transparency around the 2026 budget and to raise objections to language in the proposed spending plan that would add retirement benefits for elected council members.

Veronica Winkelman, a Westfield resident who identified her address for the record, urged the council to remove a proposed city-funded 401(a) match and to pause consideration of adding councilors to PERF, the state Public Employees' Retirement Fund, until there is a formal public discussion. Winkelman said the city's human-resources policy reserves retirement participation for full-time staff and argued that the budget should not be used to add benefits without explicit policy changes and public review.

Winkelman outlined a cost estimate she attributed to PERF participation and a city-funded 401(a) match: she said the city's employer share under PERF runs about 14.2% of wages and calculated roughly $2,680 per council member per year under that share. She…