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Councilors urge more review time for proposed charter amendment on city's budget schedule
Summary
Members said a proposed city charter amendment that would change Mount Vernon’s budget timeline needs broader council review and cannot be adopted immediately because it must be introduced as a local law and sit for 10 days.
Mount Vernon council members debated the timeline for a proposed amendment to the city charter that would revise the city's budget cycle and asked that the referral be routed more broadly for review.
Council President introduced the item and a council member raised concerns about the schedule, saying the referral “is coming from, city council president that's going to the finance and planning committee, and it should go to all council members because all council members have input on the budget.” That council member also said applying the proposed dates to this year would leave the council “essentially, like, a week” to review the budget and might require a special meeting.
The council member added, “we wouldn't be able to adopt this on Wednesday anyway because it's a charter amendment. So it would have to be local law, so it would have to be introduced by LPW and sit for 10 days before we actually adopt it.”
Councilors discussed amending the referral so all members can review the timeline and debated whether to call the item for the forthcoming agenda. The council indicated a desire to lengthen the review window and to correct the referral routing so that the finance and planning committee and all council members would have clear input.
Why it matters: Changing the charter-control timeline affects when budget decisions must be made and who reviews the schedule; council members said the proposed dates could compress the legislative review to an impractically short period.
Next steps: Councilors proposed amending the referral to broaden review and asked staff to adjust the timetable and to ensure the item is processed as a local law, which requires a 10-day period between introduction and adoption.
