Council debates proliferation of budget notes; Murillo to push restoration of city budget office positions

Councilors argued over the use and number of budget notes during the work session, with Councilor Sam Zimmerman urging restraint and Councilor Maria Murillo defending notes as an essential legislative tool.

"I think there's a deep need by the council for what we perceive as access to information," Zimmerman said, but cautioned that too many notes risked overwhelming administrative capacity and "water[ing] down a tool that I think notes can be valuable." He recommended routing some requests through committee processes to improve follow‑through.

Murillo countered that budget notes are a legitimate means for the legislative branch to direct the executive and that the City Budget Office (CBO) is critical to council work. She said she would reintroduce Murillo 9 to restore cuts to the CBO and argued those analysts are necessary for a strong legislative branch. "The city budget office is really critical to our operations and the knowledge that we have as we're preparing our budget and doing our legislation," Murillo said.

Several councilors voiced support for the CBO restoration. Councilor Green offered to partner on reintroducing the restoration if Murillo needed a co‑sponsor. Councilor Zimmerman and others said they would prefer the administration to accelerate consolidation of centralized services so the council would not need as many restorations.

Murillo said she would amend or reintroduce the restoration even if the item required a new amendment number. She described the proposed fix as preventing cuts to two CBO positions and emphasized that restoring those analysts is about maintaining legislative capacity, not adding new programs.

The council did not take a final vote during the work session. Murillo said she would refile or reintroduce Murillo 9 (the restoration of CBO analysts) in the next round of budget actions and work with colleagues on process and numbering as needed.