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City solicitor: law department budget trimmed; attorney retention improves after charter change
Summary
The law department asked for $2.9 million for FY2026, down about 1.4% from FY2025, as staffing stabilized and outside counsel needs were managed within the proposed legal‑fees allocation.
The law department presented a FY2026 proposed budget of $2,900,000, a slight decrease from the current year that officials said reflects reduced outside legal fees and completed office upgrades. OMB analyst Robert Jones told the finance committee the department’s personal‑services budget rose marginally for cost‑of‑living adjustments while the overall request is down about 1.4% because the department removed a vacant legal assistant position.
City Solicitor Robert Gough told council that recruiting and retaining attorneys had been a chronic challenge but that recent policy changes have stabilized staffing. “Good lawyers stay in their job and the city benefits,” Gough said, noting a compensation study and a charter amendment that grants tenure to attorneys after three years of satisfactory service. The solicitor said the department now retains a stable core of lawyers with municipal expertise and expects to manage the workload without restoring the eliminated legal assistant position.
The law department described its use of outside counsel and the legal‑fees line. The FY2026 legal fees request was set at $270,000, allocated across labor negotiations and litigation, real‑estate and complex transactional support. Gough and Deputy City Solicitor Rose Tassani Donardo explained that some matters — expedited chancery litigation or highly specialized transactional work — require outside firms because of their capacity, experience or ability to meet tight filing deadlines. The department provided a roster of outside law firms it uses and said selection is based on expertise, quality and competitive rates.
Council asked whether any portion of the legal fees should be reserved in the event the law department must engage conflict counsel when the office faces a client conflict; Gough said conflict‑related outside counsel would be paid from the legal fees line and that the department could, at council’s direction, increase that line to provide more explicit reserve funding.
Other items discussed included reduced temporary‑agency spending (the department said it eliminated temporary help after completing staffing), modest investments in continuing legal education for staff and the one‑time completion of office equipment upgrades that have reduced MS&E requests. The department said most current outside firms it retains are not DBE firms as defined by city procurement code but that many of the firms maintain active diversity and inclusion hiring programs.
Ending
Gough, who announced his retirement this year, thanked staff and council; Deputy City Solicitor Rose Tassani Donardo and the department’s chief administrative supervisor were introduced as continuing points of contact. Council praised the department’s staffing stability and raised no formal objections to the FY2026 request; members were invited to return any follow‑up questions to council staff.
