Council sets aside $1.35M for council offices, $1M for administration and requests 1 FTE for Department of Neighborhoods

Detroit City Council members agreed during a budget hearing to set aside $1,350,000 to discuss council office staffing and compensation in executive session, set aside a $1,000,000 placeholder to support council administrative staff (HR and EPU), and forward a request for one additional full-time equivalent for the Department of Neighborhoods to the mayor’s office for executive session discussion.

The actions were presented and approved without recorded objections. Council member Santiago Romero moved an initial proposal to reserve $100,000 per council office (totaling $900,000) to be discussed in executive session; the amount was later revised in the motion to $1,350,000 to include fringes and benefits. “For now, just setting aside $900,000 in reoccurring for each council office, to be discussed during executive session,” Romero said during the hearing. After discussion about benefit costs, the council moved $1,350,000 to executive session “to allow, if we were to bring on an additional FTE, to provide fringe benefits for them,” a council member said during the exchange.

Council members also placed a separate $1,000,000 recurring hold to support council administrative staff, including human resources and EPU. The sponsor described the amount as a placeholder pending final confirmation of administrative requests. When asked whether the $1,000,000 would be recurring, the sponsor said it would be recurring and added that the intention was to bring council staffing closer to parity with the mayor’s administration.

The hearing included a debate about district managers (referred to in the meeting as “Dons”). Council member Calloway criticized the additional manager layer, saying the positions can duplicate elected officials’ roles and add cost: “These, district managers and assisted district managers. They’re like mini council people … that whole little layer needs to go.” In contrast, Council member Comenay Young II said district managers have been helpful and said he would support expanding the program while still reviewing its effectiveness: “I think they’ve been great. I think they’ve been a real good helpmate for me.” Several council members asked that the topic be included in executive session for further discussion on scope, cost and effectiveness.

A separate motion by a council member was forwarded to the mayor’s office to add one FTE for an at-large position in the Department of Neighborhoods; the council approved adding that item to the executive session agenda without objection. The council confirmed that the $1.35 million figure was intended to cover all council offices, including at-large members, and that prior years’ requests ranged from about $1.0 million to $1.4 million when fringe and benefits were included.

The council recessed and scheduled a return at 3 p.m. for the next budget hearing and reminded the public of a 5 p.m. public hearing on the budget later the same day.