Kale Smith, the city’s acting senior manager, walked Homewood City Council members through a slate of proposed fiscal‑year 2026 budget amendments on Dec. 22, saying the changes are intended to correct administrative entry errors and reconcile fund deficits rather than change employee salaries or operational authority.

"A budget amendment moves money from one budget account line item to the other," Smith said, explaining common examples such as shifting unused uniform dollars to travel or using carryover fund balance to cover a project that came in over bid. He told the council the city budgets across 24 separate funds and that nine currently show deficits because agreed‑upon amounts were not keyed into the financial software "encode."

Why it matters: the amendments mostly use existing carryover balances or expense reductions to balance affected funds, including grants, gas‑tax accounts and court funds, and to allow the city to write purchase orders for capital projects. Smith said the action is bookkeeping and reconciliation — not new spending authority for salaries or ongoing departmental operations.

Smith highlighted several specifics from the review. The construction (bond) fund contains roughly $2,200,000 in unencumbered proceeds the city needs to obligate for named capital projects; the capital fund began the year showing nearly a $10,000,000 deficit that staff pared by roughly $6,000,000 through project and vehicle timing changes. Smith also described a fire truck that remains on order but is not payable until 2029; he said the truck’s $2.8 million price tag will require planning over multiple years.

Smith also outlined smaller examples: a grants fund that carried forward 2025 line items that should be corrected to zero because those revenues and expenses will not occur in 2026, and the 7¢ and 4¢ gas‑tax funds that staff proposes to balance using carryover fund balances so resurfacing and signal maintenance remain funded. For one court fund that showed a recurring deficit, Smith said staff will move a salary from that court fund into the police department general fund to eliminate the shortfall.

Councilors raised process questions about preventing repeat amendments, with one member asking whether departments should be given larger line items up front rather than returning to council. Smith responded that budgets and department needs evolve across a year and that mid‑year review is the appropriate time to reassess. He proposed a mid‑year review in April or May to revisit revenues and outstanding projects.

The council also agreed to carry three scheduled public hearings — a condemnation hearing for a property on Avenue South, an amended development plan for Home and Community Church (a proposed two‑story, 30,797‑square‑foot building in the GRD Renewal District), and a development plan for Brookdale University Park (to permit a football court) — to the Jan. 12 meeting. That procedural decision was announced by staff during the Dec. 22 meeting; no final votes on the hearings or the budget amendments were recorded in the Dec. 22 transcript.

What’s next: staff will finalize the corrected budget documents so purchase orders for capital work can be issued, follow up on a personnel‑board invoice flagged as over budget, and return to council for a mid‑year review in spring when staffing and revenue conditions are clearer.