Some Richmond Common Council members made clear they did not support Mayor Ron Oler’s proposed 2026 budget that was funded but not balanced.
That resulted in a new budget proposal. Council’s finance committee learned just an hour before council’s Oct. 6 meeting that significant changes had been made to the budget. City staff were preparing completely new budget documents with plans they would be ready Oct. 10 for council members.
“Our directive is we want sustainability, we want to operate in the black, and to be able to always provide essential services to our taxpayers,” said council member Justin Burkhardt, the finance committee’s chair. “There’s a lot of great things happening in Richmond right now, and it’s time for us to be as lean and diligent as possible as it relates to the budget.”
Burkhardt said he was pleased by the city administration’s effort, saying a changed budget seems to show the administration is addressing council’s concerns.
“To my pleasant surprise, I believe so, yes,” Burkhardt said. “I didn’t expect this response.”
The previously advertised budget was $65 million overall, including nearly $28 million in the general fund. Oler told council that the city would not spend about $3 million in 2025 budgeted funds, and that money would offset the 2026 budget’s anticipated $2.3 million shortfall in the general fund.
Oler, who voted against a funded but not balanced budget as a council member in 2023, said the administration had worked “really hard to find a way to get the budget more balanced, as council requested.” He appointed Beth Fields, the city’s director of strategic initiatives, to lead the renewed budget effort. Fields said city spending and revenue thus far in 2025 were being reviewed to update fourth-quarter revenue projections.
“With that information, then, we are looking at 2026 again, ensuring that we have all of the revenue represented appropriately, we have all of the expenditures listed, and then working with the finance team and the administration and council as a whole to provide an updated budget document by (Oct. 10),” Fields said.
With no finished budget, council held the budget ordinance and affiliated ordinances that would establish 2026 employee wages. The advertised public hearing was opened, but no one spoke.
Council decided to essentially start its process from the beginning. Burkhardt said the finance committee could meet Oct. 14 to review the new proposed budget. Council then scheduled a Committee of the Whole meeting at 7 p.m. Oct. 15 to receive the finance committee’s report and delve into the budget proposal. Three Committee of the Whole meetings Sept. 22-24 reviewed the initially proposed budget with department heads.
Another public hearing will be conducted during council’s regular 7 p.m. Oct. 20 meeting, and a special meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. Oct. 30 to vote on the budget. Ten days are required between the public hearing and budget adoption, which must occur before Nov. 3.
“This is a brand new budget that administration provided us (Oct. 6), and we have to make sure that we give this as much of this attention as we did the prior, because these are taxpayer dollars,” Burkhardt said.
He thanked Fields for her work late in the budget process.
“This has been very, very difficult, but we are ensuring that these numbers are correct and these are our strongest opportunity to right-size,” Burkhardt said.
Ordinance votes
Council did take action on two ordinances Oct. 6.
Two wording changes were added to a previously passed ordinance dealing with meeting transparency. The changes added “near the entrance” to a requirement that meeting notices and agendas be posted 48 hours prior to a meeting. It also added that the 48 hours excludes weekends and/or holidays.
Council unanimously approved the amendments.
Clerk Karen Chasteen requested council provide $900 from its budget for her to purchase ink cartridges. Council unanimously approved pulling $500 from its travel line item and $400 from contractual printing for transfer to the clerk’s office supplies line item.
A version of this article will appear in the October 15 2025 print edition of the Western Wayne News.