Phoenix City Policy Meeting - May 6, 2025

Good afternoon. Welcome to the policy
session of the Phoenix City Council.
I'll call the meeting to order. Will the
clerk call the role? Councilwoman
here.
Councilwoman here. Councilwoman Hodgej
Washington
here. Councilwoman Pastor here.
Councilman Robinson here. Councilwoman
Stark here. Councilman Wearing Vice
Mayor O'Brien here. Mayor Ggo here.
We'll begin with council information and
follow-up requests. We'll begin with
Councilwoman Pastor followed by
Councilwoman Hernandez.
Thank you,
Mayor. This week is teacher appreciation
week and today is teacher appreciation
day. So, let's celebrate our teachers.
Uh, as a former teacher, I continue to
be the lifelong educator. Uh, teachers
give so much to our students and to our
community. And being a teacher sometimes
includes being an emotional support aid,
a counselor, a parent, a friend, and so
much more. But most importantly, they
shape our youth. And so, if you see a
teacher, please say thank you. Next
slide. The community Hispanic
convocation. Congratulations to all the
graduates. Uh it was brought by a
coalition of members together in the
Hispanic community to celebrate Hispanic
graduates. And once again, it's the
youth in the future that we need to mold
and make sure that they are uh part of
our decision-making. Next
slide. Hope's Brunch House is new on
Central Avenue, the former IHOP. I will
highlight this new family-owned
establishment this month. Looking
forward to practicing my serving skills
as I wait on customers. Next
slide. Our veteran service center. I'm
teaming up with the vet veterans of
Foreign Wars Post 720. We are opening a
veteran service center. It will include
a three bed emergency shelter apartment,
physical and mental health navigational
assistance, food and clothing pantry. As
red costs rise and federal aid lowers,
veterans need this help. We are looking
for non-p perishable food, school
supplies, volunteers to help with labor.
If you have any uh items or would like
to volunteer, please contact my
office. Then May 8th, job fair. We are
having a job fair. over a hundred jobs
available
uh this Thursday at 10:00 a.m. It's for
all ages. If you're looking to br uh
begin your career or change your path,
we have employees looking to hire for
entry- level jobs with competitive pay
and benefits. Join us at Memorial
Hall. Next slide. Thursday, May 15th,
700 a.m. See everybody
there. Bike to Work Day is next week.
I'm so excited to host this year's
Phoenix Bike to Work Day. It's a free
event for all ages. There will be food,
raffle prizes, free giveaways, and more.
All modes of transportation are welcome.
Bikes, scooters, ebikes. That one's out
for Derek. We will start at Steel Indian
School Park and then go down to Third
Street uh bike lanes ending at Arizona
Center. Register by Wednesday, May 14th
to qualify for the raffle.
And finally, once again, contact my
office if you need any assistance. Thank
you, Mayor. Thank you. We'll go to
Councilwoman Hernandez, followed by
Councilwoman Gordado.
Thank you so much, Mayor. Um, just
wanted to give everybody a quick update
on all the happenings in District 7. Um
this past week we hosted in district 7
the Mayday march which is very very very
important um to show up and you know was
very important for me to and in and our
community show up and stand with our
workers and really standing against
Trump and his allies and their attacks.
I also got to participate in the
Hispanic convocation that we hosted at
Herburger the uh sorry at the Orifam
Theater. Um, again, community rallied
together to celebrate our our Hispanic
graduates um because of funding cuts to
our education system by the
administration. Um, also got to attend
an event at the Herburger Theater um
with the community work that they do.
I'm excited to continue to work with
them um on ensuring that they have the
resources they need. our arts, culture,
and performance are so important to our
communities and we have to continue to
make sure that they are that they are
invested into. Um, also this weekend got
to attend the light rail and capital
extension project community meetings um
at neighborhood ministries. um really
encouraging the community to
participate, provide feedback as that
project is developed to ensure that um
our communities are as least impacted as
possible that we address displacement,
any issues in that project and making
sure that the right resources are going
to our communities in district 7. Um and
then I also got to attend the volunteer
the youth awards.
Um amazing amazing youth. It kind of
made me feel like I didn't do enough as
a as a student in high school because
they blew me away with all their
accomplishments. So D7 had really
amazing winners in that and just the
youth there. I'm really really excited
and trust in what the in what the next
generation is going to build for us. So
I think we're in really capable hands.
Um and also attended the volunteer
recognition awards. Um, amazing to see a
full room on a Wednesday night and just
really celebrate our volunteers
throughout the community, including some
amazing folks in district 7. Um, so that
has been a busy few weeks. Um, our
office and team is settling in our
roles. Uh, we are continuing with daily
briefings with city departments, um,
engaging with the with the residents of
district 7. I just had a conversation
with one of our youngest constituents,
Amelia, yesterday, and she really pushed
to make sure that we are protecting our
afterchool program funding um for her
and her fellow little young scholars.
Um, so I told her that I would say it on
the dis because it was important for
everybody to hear. Um, you know, hearing
their challenges, hearing the things
that all of our constituents are
advocating for and really hearing and
connecting with them with the reality of
what our our fascist administration is
wreaking havoc on their lives now. So, a
lot is happening in district 7 in the
city. We have a lot of challenges ahead,
but I am ready and looking forward to
all the work ahead with our staff, with
our community, and really finding
solutions and a path forward. Thank you,
Mayor. Thank you, Councilwoman.
Councilwoman Gordado.
Thank you, Mayor. D5 continues to
activate and celebrate our neighborhoods
in numerous ways. We hope to see you all
at our upcoming events as we continue to
encourage neighborhood activation and
hit incredible milestones. The day is
finally here. Join us at the ceremonial
groundbreaking and celebration of
Innovation 27 Workforce Training and
Education Collaborative tomorrow,
Wednesday, May 7th, at 9:30 a.m. at
2526 West Northern Avenue. Innovation
27, scheduled to open in summer of 26,
will be a diverse space targeted at
users of all ages and will include K
through 12 and community college
education programming, business space
for startups and small businesses, a hub
for culinary support services, classes
for workforce development, and a
training center for residents to learn
new or increase their own skills to help
them succeed. A key element of
innovation 27's mission is to connect
residents with union- le training
programs, creating pathways to high
quality good paying careers in the
trades. Partnerships with local labor
unions will ensure hands-on learning
experiences and access to
apprenticeships that empower residents
to enter fields such as construction,
electrical, carpentry, culinary, and
more. We are so excited to celebrate
this incredible moment with you all
tomorrow. Thank you to all of the
partners and support for my colleagues
and the mayor that made this project
possible. Next, join us at our last
Mville Med, the summer kickoff pool
party on Saturday, May 17th from 3 to
7:00 p.m. at the Mbell Community Center.
Come and enjoy all our local vendors,
delicious food, bounce houses, live
entertainment, and the Mbell pool.
Entrance to the pool will be free of
charge. So bring your bathing suit and
get ready to kick off the summer in D5.
Then also join us at Washington Pool for
the Washington Pool Party pool pizza
party on Saturday, May 24th from 12 to
2:00 p.m. Our office will sponsor all
the pool entries, pizza, bounce houses,
games, and activities. Come out and
celebrate the opening day of Washington
Pool in partnership with the Washington
Park Association and the aquatics
division of the parks and recre
department. See you there. And finally,
we are also excited to share that we
will be celebrating 602 day at the Mbell
Community Center on Monday, June 2nd
from 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. We will be
hosting Taco Wars. So, some of our best
taco vendors get to showcase their
skills and prove who is the best of the
event. Join us in sharing your pride for
Phoenix and come out and celebrate 602
day with deep five. And I think that's
all for me now, Mayor. Thank you. Thank
you. I too am looking forward to
innovation 27 groundbreaking. Any
additional
updates? Just want to note uh some of us
are wearing green in honor of mental
health awareness month and trying to
raise awareness of the resources that
are available as well as trying to
reduce stigma. Thank you to the human
service department and all the city
departments that are part of this.
Councilman Hernandez and I also marked
heat awareness week this morning with an
event to kick off the summer season. and
uh also provide media with tours of our
new 24hour space in District 7 at 20
West Jackson. The National Word Weather
Service guys had some good news. They
said it might not be as hot as last
summer. However, it will not be cool,
but it's better news than they usually
give us. So, that was good news. With
that, we will move to the main event,
which is the city manager's budget
presentation. And I'll turn it over to
Jeff Barton, city manager, to introduce
the item. Mayor, members of the council,
thank you for your time this afternoon.
I'll be brief with my comments because I
think the meat of the presentation is
what Amber's going to walk through with
our slides. I do just want to
acknowledge your leadership, your vision
as a as a body to navigate this budget,
especially in the current economic
environment that we find ourselves with
our resources being either taken away by
action at the state level or the federal
level, as well as just seeing um a
decrease in consumer spending. And we're
seeing reduced sales tax. And so your
leadership and your vision to get us to
a place where we're able to preserve our
services and not be forced to cut
anything that our residents depend on
for their daily life, I think is is
something that should be commended. And
I want to thank you for that. And so
with that, I'll turn it over to Amber.
All right. Thank you, Jeff, mayor,
members of the council, public who are
here and attending and watching. I'm
pleased to be here to present to you the
fiscal 2526 city manager's proposed
budget. On the agenda today, I'm going
to go over a brief budget overview. I'll
recap our general fund budget status
that was presented to you on March 18th.
I'll go over the proposed 2526 budget as
well as discuss resident input and the
next steps for legal budget adoption.
So, high level, the 2526 proposed city
budget for our operating budget is $6.9
billion. That's made up of our three
main funds. Our first fund, general
funds, that's 32% of the proposed
budget. That is for our core programs
and services including police, fire,
parks, libraries, public works,
municipal court. Special revenue funds
make about 33% of our budget. That
includes our voter approved special
revenue funds including parks and
preserves, transportation 2050, public
safety, as well as Arizona highway user
revenues and our grants. And then 35% of
our operating budget is from our
enterprise funds. These are departments
who operate more like a business. They
generate their revenue directly from
individuals who use their services. This
includes water, wastewater, solid waste,
and our airports. For our general fund
next fiscal year, the estimated
operating budget is 2.2 billion. That is
primarily made up for public safety at
62% for police and fire. Community
enrichment is 11% of our total um
operating budget in our general fund.
That's for parks, libraries, human
services. General makes up about 11%.
That's for departments such as human
resources, information technology, law,
budget research, mayor and council, as
well as our city manager's office. And
then 7% of the budget is for criminal
justice, that's our municipal court,
community de development, environmental
services, and transportation. And then
9% is for our contingency or a rainy day
fund, as well as proposed set aides in
the budget for our general fund revenues
for next fiscal year. Primarily our
revenues come from local sales and
excise taxes at about 43%. Next category
35% is our state shared revenues. That's
state shared income tax, vehicle license
tax, and sales tax. 12% is from our
primary property taxes. 10% is from user
fees and others. This is primarily from
ambulance billing as well as interest
earnings. So to recap our 2526 general
fund status presented to you on March
18th. At that time, we did present a
projected deficit for next fiscal year
of $39 million. That's primarily due
again to the state's actions to
eliminate residential rental effective
January of this year, as well as to
lower the individual income tax rate to
2.5, that flat tax, as well as due to
increased operating expenses. Some
things we went over at that time to
focus on is fire emergency services. We
know we need to dedicate more resources
for our Phoenix Fire Department to bring
down response times. We also know the
American Rescue Plan Act funds that
we've been using for homelessness to
help um address those in our community
who are most vulnerable as to well as to
address the impacts of homelessness on
businesses and neighborhoods. We need to
move those expenses into our general
fund. Also, Proposition 312 that was
passed by the voters this past November.
That is that public nuisance law. We're
not quite sure what the impact will be
on the budget, but we need to make sure
we have resources in the budget to
address
homelessness. Also for salary and
benefits for our city employees, our
most important asset. We want to make
sure there's capacity in the budget as
we go forward. Council, you did approve
in 2023 the class and comp study. That's
a significant investment sorely needed
to make sure that we can remain
competitive, but we want to make sure we
have resources going forward to stay
competitive. Other budget
considerations, voters did approve the
2023 general obligation bond program.
We've been discussing this. We need to
add those ongoing operating costs to the
budget as these exciting projects come
online for the community. We also want
to make sure going forward we can do
future geo bond programs, but we have to
have the operating capacity in our
general fund to do that. We also know
our general fund revenues unfortunately
are slowing year to date. We do produce
a monthly revenue report. I encourage
everyone to read that. It's on our
website at
phoenix.gov/budget. But I did have to
lower our revenue projections in the
current year because of that. We're
following it very closely, but it is
possible as we develop new estimates
next year, we may have to lower those
further. And always from our residents,
community members don't want less
service. They typically want more
services, and we want to be able to have
the resources to meet those
expectations. Significant economic
uncertainty and volatility going on
right now with the federal
administration. also um risk continue
with the legislature in terms of
potential bills that could be signed by
the governor whether it's this session
or it's future sessions that would
continue to limit your local control,
reduce revenues further or increase our
expenses. What you're seeing on the
screen are just some bills that were
introduced and at one point were
actively moving through the legislature.
A couple of these I believe still are,
but the significance of the impact if
these were to be signed is well over $50
million per year.
So strategies that we had presented,
council approved on March 18th,
increasing the transaction privilege tax
rate from what was 2.3% to 2.8%
effective July 1st. That is to offset
ongoing revenue losses as a result of
state action and to make sure that we
can preserve general fund programs and
services. Also, council, you approved on
April 9th the excise tax bond sale. This
will primarily be dedicated to public
safety capital assets. This helps to
alleviate some cash outlay burden on our
general fund spreading out these large
capital expenditures with long useful
lives over a number of years. And then
also we did have to assume and our model
that I presented on February 25th for
the general fund forecast that $92
million of that increase in TPT we would
generate next year. We essentially save
that. We set it aside. We keep it in our
fund balance to make sure we can balance
fiscal
2627. Our city manager also committed to
rep prioritize the existing general fund
budget. We worked very closely with our
city departments. They did a great job
of going through their line item budgets
to evaluate where could they make these
reductions with very minimal impacts to
their operating budgets. No direct
service um impacts to our community
members to free up those resources to
add more critical items in the budget.
This list involves no filled city
positions. It's 18.2 vacant positions. A
full list of those cuts is included in
attachment B and your council report.
It's it's primarily contractuals,
commodities, some miscellaneous
expenditures. Again, no direct service
impact for our residents. The proposed
budget for next year um in our general
fund also includes 34 million in
supplementals or additions to the
budget. This is primarily for our
Phoenix Fire Department. Again, to
reduce those emergency response times,
we need to convert 32 sworn positions
that were funded by a safer grant that
is expiring. We need to move those into
our general fund so the hiring sworn
target does not decrease. That's 2.5
million next year. Ongoing commitment of
$5 million. Also, our first geo bond
station, 15 at 43rd Avenue in Camelback.
We need to start prehiring for those
sworn personnel, 24 positions at 2
million cost partial year next year, 4
million ongoing. And then for our office
of homeless solutions to continue the
good work that they're doing, we're
going to need to move four and a half
million next year into the general fund.
They are estimating at this point they
will need an additional $26 million
starting in fiscal 27. And then also
dedicated to our fire department, $25
million ongoing resources. This is to
add 134 sworn personnel, 19 civilian
support staff. This is to reduce
emergency response times per our fire
department. This will reduce the
localized critical emergency medical
service times from 8 minutes and 30
seconds to four minutes and 25 seconds
with a minor reduction in citywide
response times. This will increase the
fire department's sworn hiring target
from
1,865 to 2023.
So once we take these strategies into
account, we do have a different picture
for next fiscal year. With estimated
resources at 2
bill172 million less our expenditures
are the cost to deliver programs and
services of 2 bill155 million. We are
left with a projected one-time surplus
of $17
million. Our city manager is proposing
that we set that 17 million aside. It
will remain in our fund balance. We know
we have significant uncertainty as I
mentioned with either be it tariffs, its
trade policy, its taxes, its legislative
action at the federal or state level,
its potential federal funding cuts, its
inflation, its actions by the Federal
Reserve, geopolitical conflicts, just a
lot of uncertainty. So recommending to
set that aside. We want to make sure we
can preserve our current suite of
general fund programs and services as
well as have those resources for our GEO
bond program. I will take that into
account next year when we construct our
updated status for fiscal
2627. Other information before you
today, the proposed budget does include
the administrative conversions. We
include these in the budget every year.
It's 38.6 full-time equivalent
positions. This is primarily to convert
temporary positions to ongoing. No
additional funds are needed. We've
already identified savings in the
general fund budget to cover these
positions. Also, the city manager is
recommending to allocate two million in
available one-time ARPA interest
earnings to the housing trust fund. This
is to help advance efforts for
affordable housing. The proposed budget
for next year also includes a
supplemental for our water services
department, 5.6 million. This is to
reopen the Cave Creek water reclamation
plant for the um intention to expand
their capacity for treatment of
wastewater as well as to advance water
purification efforts. This is a request
council for 28 additional positions and
an addition of 20 U vehicles to their
fleet. So in terms of ways that we
engaged our residents and their
feedback, we did hold 12 community
budget hearings from April 1st through
the 16th. We also received comments to
the budget and research department
through phone and email. Overall, we
heard support from residents for our
budget, particularly to preserve our
existing services, requests for
additional funds for our fire
department, requests for additional uh
funds for eviction legal assistance, as
well as for homelessness to address heat
relief, support for street and bike
improvements, as well as particularly
for our library department, parks, and
arts and culture. Overall, we received
440 comments from 402 residents.
Attachment C in your packet provides
summary minutes of every budget hearing
as well as all of the email and phone
comments we
received. So, next steps for legal
budget adoption. We will be back before
you on May 21st for the vote. This is
the the point in time where you must
make decisions on the budget so that we
can prepare our state forms, prepare our
legally required documents to go to June
4th with tenative budget adoption. We'll
be back then again on June 18th with
final budget adoption. And then we end
our process as we always do in July,
July 2nd with the property tax levy
adoption. That concludes my presentation
and we can answer any questions. Thank
you. We'll begin with Councilwoman Hajj
Washington.
Thank you, mayor, for the opportunity to
ask a few questions. I want to say thank
you to Amber and Jeff for the
presentation. I'm specifically happy to
see that we have prioritized affordable
housing trust fund as well as going to
council budget public. Uh, one of my
questions was I saw that I've heard you
mention um the bills that you were
following in the state legislature.
Woman Washington, you're
coming. We can hear you.
Is this a little bit better? Yes.
Okay. I apologize for that. I am
traveling. But I wanted to say thank you
to Jeff and Amber for presenting the
budget to us. Thank you for the details.
Thank you for the work and listening to
the community feedback. I am
specifically very um happy to see that
we have incorporated additional fund
into the affordable housing trust fund.
Um especially with what we're seeing
happen at the federal government level.
Um and I also am grateful to see the um
council eviction assistance being u
prioritized in our budget along with
public safety and fire. Um I do have a
pending uh request for a district 8
station and I I know that we've talked
about it's not in this year's budget but
it is allocated. Um you mentioned that
on the state level the bills that were
presented this session um would net
affect about $50 million to the city. Do
we have any um idea of what the
potential impact would be from the
federal budget
cuts? What areas would be impacted and
what do we anticipate uh would be the
net financial effect for our community?
Yes, Councilwoman um Haj Washington,
mayor, members of the council, thank you
for that question. I know our city
manager's office, budget research, as
well as our city departments are
following this very closely as it seems
to be changing every day. Um what we
know as of right now, at least from the
president's proposed budget, it does
look like there's potential elimination
for the lowincome housing, I mean um
home energy assistance grants that
totals about 1.3 million potentially to
our community services block grant about
1.8 8 million for the um housing
assistance for people with AIDS. That's
roughly half a million for the CDBG
landlord tenant program. About
244,000 CDBG shelter assistance about
2.2 million. And all in all total, this
is for our human services department.
That's about nine positions and about $6
million. Um also, it is possible um CDBG
potentially could be impacted. I know
from our um neighborhood services
director Spencer literally just got this
right before this meeting. But all in
all total it does appear we have about
14.4 million about 62 positions that are
funded through CDBG. Um so as of right
now that appears to be what we what we
know. Originally we thought Head Start
um was going to also be on the table.
That's about 52 million in the human
services department's budget next year.
I think about 150 positions. It doesn't
appear that's in the the president's
budget, but of course, Congress has to
make these decisions, so we're not quite
sure where that's going to go. Um, as I
mentioned, we're following it very
closely, but at this point, we don't
know enough to actually propose any
changes in the budget other than to
bring back to the council as we're made
aware of updates on potential impacts.
And I don't know if Jeeoff, if you
wanted to add anything to that. No, I
think you covered it. Well,
thank you.
Thank you so much,
Councilwoman. I believe that is all your
questions. So, maybe we'll start with
public comment unless anyone has
anything you want to go before.
Councilwoman Anendis.
Thank you,
mayor. Make sure get my microphone over
here. Um, thank you, mayor. And you
know, I really want to thank the city
manager's office and the city manager um
for the immense work that it takes to do
that it goes into preparing the annual
budget. Um every day I'm learning
something new and you as a city staff
have been super helpful with the many
questions that the D7 office has. So
that is really appreciated. Um, I also
recognize the complexity of the task on
your, you know, in front of you,
balancing competing priorities,
addressing community needs, and
forecasting in uncertain times. I
totally understand it's no small feat.
Um, I do have some questions and just
seeking some
clarification. Um, in the budget, there
is a cut to our environmental programs
department. Um, could you just elaborate
a little bit on what that cut is?
Yes. Um, thank you for the question,
Councilman Hernandez, mayor, members of
the council. We're actually not cutting
the office of environmental programs
budget. Their budget is actually going
up about 400,000 in our general fund.
The reduction that you're seeing, I
think you're looking at schedule three
in the CCR, is we had appropriated $150
million in the current year budget in
hopes that we would receive a climate
action grant. We did not receive that
grant. So, but we had to have the
spending authority. So, overall, their
budget really isn't decreasing. As I
mentioned, it's actually increasing for
the general fund piece of it. Overall
declines you're seeing in the proposed
budget also for 2526 is because there
was a million dollar ARPA grant. Oh,
hello. I have my environmental friends
here at the table. Um, there was a
million dollars in ARPA grants that's
not continuing. Um, so that's also
causing some decline, but again, the
general fund commitment is increasing.
We're actually proposing to convert two
positions um increasing their total
count from 14 to 16 positions in that
office for food systems. that's included
in attachment A in your packet. Um, and
I I don't know if you want to add
anything else to that, Ellen. U Mayor,
Council Hernandez, I think Amber covered
it very well. If you want grant
specifics, um, Roseanne Albbright is
here to give any of that information if
you'd like. If not, we can follow up on
a separate meeting to give you the grant
specifics. Yeah, follow-up would be
great if you could get that over to us.
I just wanted to make sure that the
residents of District 7 and Phoenix as a
whole understand some of the impacts we
are already seeing in real time um to
the reduction rate in grant funding and
other programs available to to our
residents. Um and given that Phoenix we
are hugely impacted by climate um I
think it's really important that any
environmental funding we have we try to
find ways to maintain it. Um especially
in District 7 that's so impacted by heat
and other environmental impacts. Um, so
thank you for that. My next question,
um, you know, as I just said, we've
already seen Trump's attacks on our city
departments. Um, you know, Amber just
shared a list of items that are
potentially on the chopping block. Um,
we also heard about the reduction in
funding for emergency housing
vouchers. They are cutting HUD funding.
Um, we've seen action against what you
just mentioned, LIE, Headstar, the
community service block grants. Um, so
if you could uh if we could get a list
of that over to the office of all those
programs you mentioned. Um, and do we
have as a city, do we have a plan to
protect some of this uh these programs
in the next fiscal year? Councilwoman
Hernandez, I I'll start with that answer
and Amber, if you want to add anything
to it. I think as far as getting you the
list, we can definitely do that and as
we update it, we'll make sure that all
council members have access to that
list. It, as Amber said, it is a daily
evolving thing. based on you know the
temperature and the mood it seems like
um based on what we're seeing um as far
as a plan what I would say is at this
stage not knowing definitively what is
going to be cut we would treat that like
any other you know dwindling resource
and we would bring that back to council
um I think that's another good reason
for why we're recommending that we save
that $17 million again based on the list
that Amber shared with you and what we
think could also be cut it wouldn't
cover everything that could potentially
be eliminated from the federal level,
but it at least gives us an opportunity
if that's something the council wants to
do to try and transfer that in. What I
would tell you that if we have any
significant reduction to any federally
funded or state funded program at this
stage, given where our budget is as we
presented it over the last couple of
months, we would require a a a reduction
in a general fund program equal to what
you're trying to bring in from a federal
program. Um because there really is no
more capacity in the general fund at
this point. Okay. Thank you. And Jeff,
thank you for bringing up the 17 million
set aside um to respond to some of the
uncertainty we're seeing from this
administration. Um is there plans to set
aside any other money to protect our
workers and our families um from Trump?
Um, Councilwoman Hernandez, mayor,
members of the council, as as we build
our budget, the $17 million set aside is
what we've got in that was kind of
one-time money that we felt was better
that we just hold in reserve until we
figure out what's going on next year. We
also, if you remember from the
multi-year forecast, we discussed this
prior to you you actually taking your
seat, but we also did have another set
aside that we were using as a glide path
for fiscal year 2627. Um, so we'll
continue to monitor the situation. Um we
will have labor negotiations coming up
um at the beginning of next calendar
year. Um but that's also another reason
why we wanted to set some of that money
to the side. We don't know what labor
negotiations holds for us and and
wanting to be able to possibly you know
address that situation if we had to.
Okay. Thank you. Um you know the other
thing in the budget
and you know I think a lot of us I know
I and you know what let me speak for
myself. I look at a budget as a moral
document of where we're prioritizing
investments. Um, over the past decade,
Phoenix Police's budget has steadily
increased. Um, now with this new fiscal
budget or the new fiscal year, we are
now surpassing $1 billion because
there's an $46 million increase um, just
this upcoming year alone. Meanwhile, we
are seeing many community services uh
services that address root causes of
harm such as affordable housing, youth
programs, environmental justice, public
health, violence pre prevention remain
underfunded. Um can you speak to what
the $46 million increase represent
represents? Yeah, I'll turn that over to
Amber because I'm pretty sure she can
speak specifically to the line items
that drive that cut. Thank you, Jeff.
Thank you, Councilwoman Hernandez,
mayor, members of the council. So,
police's budget is primarily increasing
as a result of personal services. So,
that's primarily salaries. They do
receive merit increases, both civilian
and sworn staff. Pension also makes up
about 20 million of that amount. We're
we're contractually obligated. We need
to meet our pension obligations. We also
have increases for health insurance. Um,
as well as the council back in September
at the policy meeting did direct our
city manager's office to increase
certain items for the police department.
This includes things like an early
intervention system, a voice active
intelligence system, adding four
additional positions. Um so and
vehicles, $6 million increase for for
vehicle replacements. The the cost of
each unit um for citywide vehicles, but
particularly for police replacements of
their patrol vehicles has really
significantly increased. So that is what
makes up predominantly the increase in
the police department's budget. Okay.
Um, and are you able to share how many
sworn officers are represented in the
police budget versus how many sworn
officers are currently on staff?
The number of um budgeted sworn police
position or their hiring target is
3,125. They're roughly 500 positions
short of that in terms of a filled
count. Okay. Thank you. Um, and how are
we evaluating the long the long-term
impacts of continually increasing um
funding for policing while we are not
investing the same levels into social
infrastructures?
Mayor, members of council, that that's a
good question. I think at this stage,
when you go back over the last several
years, majority of the increases that
we've had in our budget have been more
on the social services side rather than
in public safety, except for the fire
department. Um, over the last couple of
years, we've been really adding a lot to
fire, especially with the the addition
of the expansion of the CAP program, as
well as the bonfunded fire stations and
the non-bond bonfunded fire stations
that we're adding over the last couple
of years. Um, the police department
budget, aside from like Amber talked
about just the normal growth in pension
costs, the cost in um, salaries and
fringe and total comp as well as just
the other inflationary increases. Um the
council has done I think a good job at
trying to contain the growth in the
police department budget to the extent
that they can. Uh we have added about
$11 million worth of new programs over
the last couple of years in police, but
the lion share of that was done um by
virtue of trying to keep it within the
existing footprint of the police
department budget. All right. Thank you,
Jeff. Um, if I can get I just have a
couple requests for follow-up
information from staff and it would be
well I already asked for the list of the
programs that potentially can see cuts.
Um, for fiscal year 26, can we get the
sworn wage and benefit projection report
and also the nonsworn wage and benefit
projection projection report?
Councilwoman Hernandez, yes, absolutely.
We'll get that to you. Perfect. Thank
you. Um, you know, I want to be very
transparent with the city staff, with my
fellow council members, and the and our
D7 constituents. Um, I'm I am a no on
this budget as it stands today. I I have
a lot of concerns about the proposal.
Um, our city is literally already under
attack from Trump's federal
administration cuts and I don't believe
that this budget pushes hard enough to
respond to those attacks and to protect
our people and our workers, our city
workers and our programs. Um, I also
feel I do not feel that this budget
positions us for future attacks from
this administration. Um, and it doesn't
prepare us to respond to the recession
that is very likely on the horizon. Um,
also it should be of surprise to no one
that I have a huge concern over the $1
billion budget that is going into our
police department. Um, as I said, our
budget should be our moral document. It
should be our north star of how we are
investing into our people. And what this
message, like what are we sending this
message to the public? We're saying that
we are going to continue to underinvest
into root cause solutions that would
reduce community hardships um and
protect our residents. And once again,
we are increasing police funding that
and responding to the crisis that our
communities are facing with more
criminalization, more and more threats
of police violence. Um, to be honest, 17
million dollars in set aides or
reactionary spending will be a drop in
the bucket to Trump's hundreds of
millions of dollars in tax in cuts. Um,
I believe we need to be proactive and
invest now into the programs that will
protect our residents because the worst
is going to come. Now is the time to
invest into right to counsel, into
affordable housing and homeless
prevention, protections for reproductive
health services, in rights for our
LGBTQIA plus community, um, immigrants
and refugee support services, racial
equity and anti-discrimination
initiatives, climate resiliency and
environmental justice, public education
and youth partnership initiatives, as
well as voting access and civil
engagement. Um, I want to make it clear
to the residents of D7 that they sent me
here with the mandate and I will
continue to fight for these program for
investments into these programs and I'm
going to push to make sure that our
budget fights fights back against
Trump's cuts. I invite my I invite my
fellow council members to join me in
that fight and I'm looking forward to
working really hard with the city staff
to address the crisises that our city
faces. Um, thank you so much.
Thank you, Councilwoman Pastor.
Yes. I want to talk about the investment
that we've already made and there are
several areas of maintenance that is
reducing their funding and I have sat on
this council where past decisions on
maintenance pieces
uh then as I as the past decisions were
made as I sat on the council then I had
to uh vote on some of the areas that
maintenance didn't happen and we had a
liability issue and had to put more and
more money into that space. So, I'm
looking at
um and you can correct me if I'm reading
this wrong.
Um the fact that we're going to reduce
uh landscaping maintenance on our city
properties that already have some ble. I
mean, we get that complaint all the
time. I'm looking at uh the reduced
funding for maintenance of our art
collection that we fought really hard to
get funding for maintenance and our
facilities of the children's museum,
Phoenix Art Museum, and Phoenix Theater.
I'm assuming I'm going to hear it's
going to part of the geo bond, but the
go bond, but I'm just putting it out
there. And then maintenance in our
parks. um park maintenance and capital
equipment replacement funding. And that
is crucial because that in order for our
parks to be vibrant and survive, we need
maintenance of those items.
Um and then public works, uh eliminate
non-critical minor maintenance projects
for city facilities. Uh I think
maintenance in general, non-critical or
critical are needed anyways regardless.
And this is items that we've already
invested in for community. So that's
where my concern is. I'm hoping that u
Amber, I see you have an answer, but I'm
going to just place it on the record.
Okay. Thank you. Um, Councilwoman Pastor
may mayor, members of the council, as I
said back on March 18th, no cut is easy.
Um, what Jeff's direction to departments
was to identify 5% and reductions. Um,
and departments did that. I I think that
the items that you're mentioning,
particularly starting with landscape
maintenance, what I'm being told by
Spencer, our neighborhood services
director, is that it's decreasing the
number of annual maintenance from 12 to
7. He does not believe that's going to
have a significant impact to landscape
maintenance needs. Um overall for our
public works department, the $500,000
that you're mentioning, their operating
budget is roughly $36 million. The
500,000 is is really for very minor type
um um maintenance items like replacing
worn carpet. Um my understanding from
the public works director uh Felipe is
that that's not going to have a
significant impact to their ability to
maintain facilities, particularly
anything that is um related to security
or safety. Um that 500,000 wouldn't be
touching those types of of maintenance
items. We are very committed to
increasing the budgets where we can for
maintenance of all city assets, whether
that's facilities, it's our fleet. Um
and and I think that the 24 million
that's proposed as these rep prioritized
cuts, it represents about 1% of the
operating budget. Um it was a commitment
as I mentioned by Jeff to do that. The
last one I would I would mention as well
is for arts. um the the reduction in the
in the arts program. We have added
additional supplementals to the office
of arts and culture over the last prior
three fiscal years from fiscal 22
through fiscal 24. And so I know it's
not ideal, but it was the request of our
city manager to try to have all of those
departments try to identify some sort of
a reduction, but I can certainly
understand where you're going with that
that it it's not easy to to make any
cut. And and I would I would if I could,
the only thing I would also add to that
is is Councilwoman Pastor, your
historical depiction of what we've done
for maintenance in prior years when it
was time to balance the budget. We did
defer and kick maintenance and that that
created these bubbles and it also
created issues in facilities that blew
up to bite us later. Um we are
definitely not doing that. Several years
ago, between budget and research and the
public works department, we created a
major maintenance program where we
thoroughly evaluate all major
maintenance needs across the entirety of
the general funded departments. And we
have uh funding dedicated and set aside
which was not there previously to
address those. And we've got a a a
quadrant-based matrix that we evaluate
all of those programs and all of those
projects on to ensure that the highest
priority projects get funded. And if
additional funding is needed, then we
evaluate that on a case-by case basis.
So, uh, to your concern, we're
definitely not, um, ignoring
maintenance. And I'm going to my concern
because there are many years of not
maintaining our city facilities and not
maintaining many different pieces. And
then it bit us in the end
because people got hurt. Uh, not hurt.
Well, not hurt. I will take that back.
Uh
people were looked looked at as not
doing their job in the sense of
maintaining the building. We had to pay
insurance. There was a liability and it
just continued. And I want to be
cognizant because I did make a promise
to myself in the sense if I was ever
going to be voting on a budget to make
sure we're maintaining what we need to
maintain.
Um, I know we have multiple cityowned
properties. So, are you telling me that
seven times per year is going to cover
all our properties?
I would actually ask Spencer, if he's
here, to come to the table to respond to
your question in regards to the impact
of reducing it from 12 to 7.
Mayor, uh, Councilwoman, uh, so just to
clarify briefly, uh, this budget that's
included in the neighborhood services
department is not, uh, tied to all
city-owned property. It is specifically
for the vacant parcels that we've
acquired over the years. Um, as you're
well aware, one of our goals is to
dispose of those properties and
especially to build affordable housing.
There's a number of properties that we
have put on the market this year, more
that we have planned for next year. Um,
as well as we we will our goal is to
better manage when we're maintaining
rather than standard monthly, if that
makes sense. Yes. And so, thank you for
the clarity because I think it's we need
clarity sometimes in our budget to add
to understand what is happening. Um, and
you're correct. We are uh there are par
parcels in in particular district 4 that
uh will be going out uh into the
affordable housing space and be able to
uh build on those properties and uh
remove the ble or it's not ble but
remove an empty lot. So I do understand
and want to thank you for that. I also
want to say uh thank you to the team
because I know how difficult this is and
I know how challenging it is and really
uh thank the departments uh being very
cognizant on the areas that they are
cutting because it is difficult to cut.
Um it's like any household bill, you
have to cut your household bill, but
we're running lean now um in that sense.
And so I just want to thank thank you
for that. Um and appreciate it. I just
wanted to put items on the record so
that in the future if it pops up I could
say, "Hey, we said we were going to do
this, so let's do it." So thank you.
Thank you, Councilwoman. Would does
anyone have comments or questions before
we go to
public? All right.
Um, why don't we begin with online
Teresa
Hill? Followed by Mercedes
Samaria. Governor and Council, I would
like to share a few of my budget cuts
proposals concerns. On page 13, we talk
about the fire technology, equipment
being replaced and training that is
needed, but we're not looking at what if
those systems go down. If they continue
to be put on the back burner, we may
have systems that fail. Again, in um
page 14, again, we're cutting back on
servers and equipment. We're cutting
back on our staff, which are prime
examples, as we say, our assets from
having the training that they need. Uh,
page 15, the munisable courts, um,
eliminating a vacant position, yes, but
it says cases will be postponed. It'll
be moved. There will be delays in the
criminal court dates. And I think we
need to leave that position. in under IT
administration. Again, it needs to be
looking at in this case it talked about
that this will impact assistant staff.
Assisting our staff is highly important
and it states that employees use this in
their daily activity. So for them to not
even be able to call their IT for that
additional assistance concerns me of are
we there for our people? And I
understand the police um budget is high.
I ask you to look at the equipment that
they're using in the background because
as an IT prior employee, I know what
it's like for a system to go down and my
department not to be able to call and
get the help they need because we don't
have the resources or the equipment to
keep it going. So, I just ask you to um
re-review these items and hopefully uh
keep them in mind as you're moving
forward to put our employees ahead
because without them we don't run. Thank
you for your time and allowing me to
share these concerns on some of the
cuts. Thank you.
Thank you for the testimony. Mercedes is
next, followed by Patrick McDaniel.
Hi, my name is Samra Mercedes Winens.
I'm a volunteer with Roombo. I'm a
current resident artist of Marbel and
have lived here for 20 years. I care
about efforts to combat heat in Marville
because I want to see my future in this
village. I was raised here and hope to
keep living here well into my adult
years in retirement. With rising heat,
it has become extremely difficult to
live here. Mville is well undered for
and underfunded and disproportionately
affected by the heat. The heat impacts
me every day. I use the bus to commute
every day for work. It gets very hot
where it makes walking a short distance
difficult. We need more shaded bus stops
now. I walk to the shopping malls in
distance to my home. It's hot and makes
it difficult. We need weather ready
streets with shaded sidewalks, cooler
pavement and materials that absorb storm
water. Marville is a heat point and I
ask for your support and urge you to
vote favorably that there is funding for
Marville in the city budget. You
represent us and have a responsibility
to help Mville and have the ability to
vote for funding for heat resilience
solutions for us. It is important to
sustain the enriched culture and
community that makes up this village.
This starts with efforts and funding to
make it liveable for residents like me.
Thank you.
Thank you. Patrick is
next, followed by
Timothy, Mayor Ggo, members of council,
uh thank you for the opportunity to
speak today. I'm speaking today in my
capacity as advocacy director for
Phoenix Community Alliance. Um, as an
organization, we understand that the
city has been placed in a difficult
situation taken by actions at the state
legislature as well as by previous
actions of previous governors. Uh, PCA
supported the transaction privilege tax
increase knowing that this was needed to
submit a balanced budget as required by
law. We support this proposed budget as
the best mechanism to maintain current
levels of service while increasing
services in much needed areas. Uh the
service providers of our social and
housing advancement committee applaud
the additional funding for the office of
homeless solutions which will help set
um expiring ARPA funds. Um this
additional funding will help with
shelter operations throughout the city.
Um the office of homeless solutions has
made great strides in a very short
amount of time and we know that these
this additional funding will go to um
increase their efforts. We also support
the funding for the low-income senior
housing center at the Black Canyon
Boulevard location. As this funding will
help the most vulnerable um of our of
our residents here in the city of
Phoenix. While we are supporting his
organization, we ask that no further
reductions be made to historic
preservation programs. In a city as
young as Phoenix, we need to take steps
to safeguard our past. And uh like I
said, in such a young city, we need to
maintain what we have. Um looking
forward to the future, we ask that no
funding for active transportation and
pedestrian safety are considered. um in
in in order to encourage multimodal
transportation in everchanging downtown
landscape. Finally, uh to echo the
comments of Councilwoman Pastor, we
respectfully uh request that the
$175,000 funding reduction to the Office
of Arts and Culture please be
reconsidered as this could be
detrimental to the uh to the Children's
Museum of Phoenix, the Phoenix Art
Museum, and the Phoenix Theater. So once
again, thank you for the opportunity to
speak today and thank you to all the
city staff for the incredible amount of
work they put into this, the community
outreach and the preparation of this
budget. So once again, thank you. Thank
you. Timothy Gamage is next, followed by
Joshua Gonzalez.
Good afternoon. My name is Tim Gamage,
executive vice president of Local
493. Uh, I didn't wear a union shirt
today cuz I'm coming to you guys as a uh
resident of the city of Phoenix who's
raising five children here and I am
concerned still about the fire crisis in
our city. Uh, I want to thank you guys
for the impact you made with passing the
TS or TPT and getting us some more
resources, but there are still big gaps
in our city that need to be filled. Uh,
Councilwoman Hernandez spoke about some
issues going on in her district, which I
lived in as a child, so I am empathetic
to those. Uh, one thing you didn't
mention was the, uh, lack of of
resources in your area. Uh, in regards
to the fire department, that's something
that definitely needs to be looked at as
well.
Uh all the stuff we've talked about here
today is important, but in our line of
work, life safety is the most important
thing. And and that's what the fire
department does for the city of Phoenix.
So hopefully you all consider that and
if we can find a way to get another fire
engine or two, it'll help my kids be
safer. Thank you. Thank you. Joshua is
next, followed by Magdalena.
First, I'd like to thank the council for
allowing me to speak tonight. My name is
Joshua Gonzalez Himenez. I'm a volunteer
with Roombo today, a communitydriven
initiative working to combat extreme
heat, and I'm here to speak about Mville
and its extreme heat. While I haven't
lived in Mville full-time, I've spent
many afternoons there visiting friends
and family, seeing firsthand how
scorching and unrelenting the heat can
be, especially in the
summer. Mville is the hottest area in
the city. On average, 4 to 6 degrees
hotter than any other neighborhood
during the summer and in some spots up
to 22 degrees warmer at night due to the
immense amount of asphalt. NASA's
EcoTress surface temperature maps have
recorded a 120 to 160 degrees Fahrenheit
on Mville sidewalks on days when the air
hit 16° F. Hot enough to cause to cause
burns in seconds. Through our
conversation with neighbors, one message
remains clear, and that's that we needed
more heat resilient public spaces,
shaded sidewalks, cooler bus stops, and
safer, more walkable streets that let
residents move through Marville safely
and comfortably. And while we appreciate
everything that's been done so far, such
as the creation of the city's office of
heat response and mitigation to
coordinate cooling strategies citywide,
we respectfully urge the council to
prioritize targeted investments in
Mville. We're calling for dedicated
funding in the city's 25-26 budget for a
community-led heat planning effort in
Mville carried out in partnership
between the office of heat response and
mitigation and rumo leaders.
Specifically, we propose cool proof
public spaces, more open to green areas,
engineer engineered shade structures at
every bus stop in Mville, so no rider
waits more than a few minutes under
direct sun with pavement exceeding 100°
Fahrenheit. And cool corridors on key
pedestrian and bike routes, combining
reflective pavement, treatments, and
overhead shading to drop ambient
temperatures and improve air quality.
Thank you for your leadership. I am here
to respectfully ask for your support in
moving this effect forward. With your
backing and clear budget allocation, we
can protect Mville's children, seniors,
and everyone else who calls this
neighborhood home from record-breaking
heat. Thanking Thank you guys for your
time and
[Music]
commitment. Thank you. Magdalena is
next, followed by Christopher.
[Music]
is
Phoenix organiz
I gotcha.
[Music]
taxes.
Much gracias.
Good
afternoon. I'm a voluntary with the
organization named Roombo. My name is
Magdalena Aila de Marin. My concern is
uh how is it that we're going to be
working together and what plan do you
have uh to uh
invest? There's uh less trees in
Maravevel, which is the hottest place
here in Phoenix.
We need to have a plan for our
organization. We need more trees, safer
streets, and more lighting. We need more
shading. And we need our stores, parking
lots, uh to have more shading and if
possible also solar panels to be
installed. We need more help to work on
the global warming which is causing lots
of disas disasters. If we don't have a
plan and if we don't work on it, we need
to uh work on this
climate. We pay taxes here in Marville
and we deserve a beautiful environment.
We need and want more programs so to
help people. We want
help programs that were designed to
fight against the heat also invest in
businesses and so that people we can
have better pedestrian
traffic. The temperatures every day are
getting hotter and harder and there's
times when it's over 110 degrees for
over 10 days straight and there's more
deaths because of this. So we want to
work we want you to work together with
our organization and create a plan with
Roombo. We need to work with the leaders
in Marville so that we can get these
temperatures down. So I thank you very
much.
Thank you. Gracias. Christopher is next
followed by Annne Ender.
Good afternoon. My name is Christopher
Pierre. I'm a proud local native of
Phoenix and Phoenix firefighter that
serves the downtown area. I speak today
as a concerned citizen and firefighter.
As a firefighter, life safety is my
number one priority. It is important now
more than ever to have appropriate
responding apparatus that have water
capabilities responding to fire
incidents due to the increasing dem
demographic downtown.
We have identified a critical need for
this in the area I respond to in fire
station 3's first do which has the
highest rate of displaced or unhoused
individuals in the metropolitan area.
Unfortunately, this is best exemplified
by our burn data. Displaced individuals
or people experiencing homelessness have
had the highest rate of burn incidents
in the greater metropolitan area
resulting in multiple fatalities. We
have had multiple fire incidents that
have had apparatus without water
capabilities responding drastically
changing outcomes and delaying critical
emergency care. We need to do better. As
stated, the downtown area has boomed in
terms of population size and
demographic. As the population has
risen, so has the demand for resources,
most notably housing and high-rise
structures. From 2015 to 2019, there
were 37 completed residential and
commercial high-rise building totaling
over 5,000 dwellings in a three-mile
radius of downtown. Another estimated
3,000 multifamily housing units are
expected to be added over the next 5
years. National Fire Protection
Association standards 1710 and 1221
outline the minimum requirements for
fire department resources and response
during high-rise incidents. We do not
meet those standards. Our current
high-rise response falls seven
firefighters and one to two engines
short in the downtown area. High-rise
responses are one of the most dangerous
incidents we respond to. We currently
have 12 to 15 unsinkled residential or
commercial high-rise buildings in this
immediate area. These incidents are
high-risisk, low frequency, and can be
devastating when sustained. My ask is
that a portion of the TPT funding be
allocated towards our firefighters and
their downtown response to these
incidents. It is a critical need and gap
that has been identified by our
firefighters and one that should not
wait until a major incident or fatality
has occurred. We know this area is
growing and we have a chance to get
ahead ahead of it now. Thank you. Thank
you. And is next followed by Daphne.
Good afternoon. Thank you so much for
the opportunity to speak and I'm now
going to have to go off script. Sorry.
Um I want to echo everything that Mr.
damage and the other firefighters have
said and I'm very uh grateful for you
approving the TPT increase and for a
really balanced budget that focuses on
public safety. And I want to uh let you
know as far as our police department
right now we have
2485 sworn which means on a good day we
have 30 officers per shift covering 1.7
million people.
So, when you talk about the dangers of
of um what what fire responds to and
what our police department responds to,
I just turned 68 and on my birthday, I
went up with air patrol. And let me tell
you, that's when you see what happens in
our city. That's when you get the
perspective as I watched two officers
walk into a warehouse where someone had
broken in, not knowing if there was a
gun, if there was more people. It really
made me think about what they do. And
honestly, I I kind of fall a lot. So, I
want to be able to have somebody respond
when I get hurt. So, I'm grateful for
this and I hope we never consider
cutting our public safety budget. Thank
you. Thank you. Deafany is next,
followed by
Valerie. Hi, council members. Uh, my
name is Daffhne Cortez and I'm a climate
community organizer with Rainbow. First,
I want to thank the city of Phoenix and
the entire council for your continued
efforts in our neighborhoods and for
creating space for community voices and
these very important conversations. I'm
here today speaking about something
urgent and deeply personal to my entire
community. Mville is the hottest area in
Phoenix, averaging 4 to 6° hotter than
other neighborhoods during the summer.
I've had countless conversations with
residents. One message continues to rise
to the top. Um, we need more heat
resilient public spaces. This means more
shaded walkways, cooler bus stops, and
safer, more walkable streets so that
people can move through their
neighborhoods without risking their
health. I'd love to see more cool
corridors in the neighborhoods that
connect the community to their plazas or
schools. These are the most popular
things that the people of Mville would
like to see. Again, I'm here today
recognizing the efforts that have
already been made by the city, have been
made citywide, and we're very grateful.
Um, but Mville needs more. It's time for
more intentional, targeted investments
that meet the urgency of what we're
facing in here. Um, what we're facing.
Uh so I'm here today asking you to
include a dedicated funding in the city
uh 2025 to 2026 budget for a
community-led heat planning effort in
Mville. We envision a true partnership
between the office of heat response and
mitigation and Rimbo leaders working
together to build solutions that reflect
the lived experiences and needs of
Mville residents. Thank you guys.
Thank you. Valerie is next followed by
Amanda.
Good afternoon. My name is Valeria
Marine and I am here with Rimbo and I
am been a resident of Arizona since
1997. I have seen multiple cities in the
area grow such as Mesa, Poria, Aendale,
and Tempe. However, it was when I lived
in Tempe for a few years where I was
able to stop and see the differences in
how the city investes in its people and
the
town. I have seen little investment made
to in the beautiful township of Mville.
We, the people of Mville, are taxpaying
voters who want to see investments made
to make our city better for our
community. Mville is one of the hottest
places in Phoenix due to little green
and no shaded spaces. Arizona had over
600 heat related deaths in 2024 and
between 2023 and 2022 there was a 52%
jump in those heat related deaths. 6% of
those deaths were um people at bus
stops. That is too
many. Some of our stops have no seats.
Some of them have no shade. This makes
public transit
hard, hard to get to, and hard to use.
People say that it takes a village while
the village is here, and we are working
very hard, and we need the city to work
with us and invest in Mville. If you can
succeed in Mville, you have the
blueprint to make Arizona a cooler
state. When you invest in Mville, you're
investing in Arizona and you're
investing in saving lives.
and thank you so much for your time.
Thank you. Amanda is next, followed up
by Ora.
Good afternoon, mayor and council
members. My name is Amanda Kaminskus,
and for the past 20 years, I have
dedicated my life to supporting my
unhoused neighbors, focusing the last 5
years in Phoenix, particularly Mville,
where I moved in 2021. Every summer I
distribute thousands of bottles of water
and essential supplies. I have noted the
hottest parts of Mville consistently
reach temperatures 3 to six degrees
higher than the rest of the city. This
extreme heat has severe consequences. I
have encountered individuals so
dehydrated and in crisis that some have
hallucinated and told me that they
believed I was an angel. Tragically, I
witness that sometimes those who do not
survive these conditions, many times at
bus stops, highlighting the urgent need
for action. Partnering with Roombo, we
are working to urge the city to allocate
more funds for a dedicated heat plan for
Mville. We're advocating for more parks,
trees, and green spaces along with along
with cooling drinking fountains, natural
and man-made shade, improved walkways,
and largest shaded bus stops. These
improvements are vital to protect our
residents, especially those without
homes, from life-threatening heat. Let's
commit to making Phoenix, especially
Mville, a safer, more sustainable, and
more humane place. It's time to
rejuvenate this overlooked community
into a thriving area for all its
residents. Thank you for your time.
Thank you. Orla is next.
Good afternoon. Phoenix Fire has been
running in crisis mode for over 10
years. Mayor Ggo and city manager
Barton, you both claim this fire
department response time crisis is due
to past underfunding and current state
legislature cuts. However, Mr. Barton,
you've been city manager since 21 and
have been active in the city's
management and budgeting for 10 years.
Mayor Ggo, you served on the Phoenix
City Council from 2014 to 2018, becoming
mayor in 2019. Therefore, both of you
have worked for the city during this
crisis. So, you cannot blame those in
office prior to you, nor the current
legislature cuts. Voters are being buil
for fire stations that were voted on and
passed in the 23 GO bond to solve the
response time crisis. Yet, it will be
years before these stations will be
built and put into service. The city is
going to have to take drast drastic
measures to fully fund the fire
department and fasttrack the building of
fire stations. People are dying now. We
can't wait an upwards of 3 to 5 years to
start seeing action. We're the fifth
largest city in the country and you
can't get fire stations built. However,
Mayor Ggo, you brag about bringing TSMC
here. You bring a billion-doll company
to Phoenix and you can't even keep your
citizens and first responders safe. It's
time that the city of Phoenix take
accountability instead of writing checks
for response time lawsuits and fund your
safety departments until at least each
district meets and maintains the
national standard for response times.
You're trying to pass this increased tax
rate under the guise of solving the fire
response time crisis, but what is being
proposed is not
enough. Halt all of their spending.
Public safety for your citizens and
firefighters supersedes anything else.
You're killing people now and are
criminally negligent by not immediately
diverting funds and putting up emergency
stations to address this. The citizens
deserve better and our first responders
who we owe so much to deserve better.
Thank
you. That concludes public comment.
Maybe we'll begin with the city manager.
Could you give us an update on fire
department investments?
Sure, Mayor. Um, as as I've said
repetitively over the last couple of
months as we were developing this
budget, we we're forced to make some
very difficult and challenging decisions
to preserve the existing level of
services that we've got. And I do want
to say that the fire department under
your direction and your leadership as a
collective body has done quite well over
the last 10 years. Um for example um
between 2016 and 2017 the fire
department budget total budget all funds
has gone up 89% as well as their general
fund budget during that same period of
time has gone up 91%. A lot of that is
driven by the pay and compensation
increases that this council and the fire
department themselves as well as their
labor group felt were really important
for them to continue hiring and staffing
the fire department with the best. Um, I
would also like to say that this budget
with the projected $25 million in
additional general fund increases that
are proposed, which include 134 sworn
FTEE, as well as the 2023 bond program
funded stations that will be built over
the next four years, which includes 119
FTE, will increase the fire department
field count, sworn field count, from 185
1,865 positions to
2,118. That's an increase of 503
positions over the last 10 years. I
don't think any other department in the
city can say anything close to that. And
that's roughly a 13% increase. I think
it's also important to recognize that
going back, we hadn't had a bond program
until the 2023 bond program. It's been
almost 20 years since we've had a bond
program and this bond program being 500
million. Public safety got roughly 25%
of that bond program and roughly 90% of
that was for specifically for the fire
department. Um, as it pertains to the
existing TPT increase that this council
just recently voted on, fire is getting
roughly 210 mo of that increase, which
is roughly 40% of the entire increase of
that that sales tax that that you just
voted on. So again, to that point,
mayor, I don't think that this council
has been remiss in their ability to add
to fire. Can we add more? Should we add
more based on response times? I think
the answer to that we all know is yes.
We'd love to, but again, you are forced
to balance the budget and balance the
needs of the entirety of the city. And
based on what I can see financially,
you've done a great job doing that with
the resources that we have at our
disposal.
Thank you for that important update,
Councilwoman Gordado.
Thank you, Mayor. Well, first I just
want to say um thank you to the team for
putting together um this budget. I know
that we've been having very tough
conversations
um since the state started um with the
cuts at the city and with all the things
that we've seen at the federal level.
You know, I truly do appreciate all the
work that Amber and Jeff and the whole
team has been doing. And to all of our
um assistant city managers and our
directors, I know that it's not easy to
say where we're cutting and what we're
doing. and also u really appreciate the
commitment of not cutting any services
that affect um the community and also
not trying to undo a lot of the work um
that we have been doing um for the last
six years. I know that we've um
definitely have taken advantage of the
ARVA dollars to like really um help the
community deal with a lot of the
challenges and issues um that people are
also talking about today. But I guess
Amber, I just had a question um for you
um just to put on the record. Um when it
comes to heat resilience and the plans
that we have around cool pavement and
planting more trees, are we doing any
cuts around
that? Councilwoman Guardo, mayor,
members of the council, no. So when you
look at attachment B that's in your city
council report, that is the list of the
$24 million and reductions. the office
of heat sustainability and the office of
environmental programs is not included
in that list.
Great. Thank you for that. And and I
understand, you know, Mville is a huge
village. It's it's about it's a little
bit over 200,000 people um that live um
just in the Mville village that's
covered um by three different um council
members. And and so I guess I would ask
Jeff like it would be nice um to get a
report, you know, that we can that that
we can all just have in terms of how
many miles of coup pavement we've
actually done throughout Mville.
Understanding that is, you know, one of
the hottest villages um in in the city
of Phoenix. you know, how many um
mileers we've done of cool pavement, how
many um bus stops we've added shade, um
what is it that we have now, what is it
that we're going to have in the future,
and then also um you know, also a report
on how many trees we've also actually
planted um throughout Murray and then
also um how many schools we've also
helped in terms of planting trees.
Again, I don't think that we're done. I
I I think there's still a lot of work um
to be done in a lot of areas. And I know
that we've also talked about a lot of
these parcels um a lot of these
businesses that contribute um to the
heat that we continue to feel um in in
in the Mville area given that you know
when we were building um these not us
but people before us um were
constructing um these big u marketplaces
and and we see how that contributes to
the heat. Um, but if we can get if at
least, you know, like, you know, whoever
on the council wants it, but it
definitely at least the council members
in in the Mville area so that we can
also be I mean, I could probably talk a
little bit about the D5 area, but it'd
be nice to see how much we've actually
already done um in Mville and what is it
that we're planning to do in the future.
I know we have at least in D5, you know,
there's at least four more miles that if
it wasn't because it rained this week,
um um there's a lot of cool pavement
that would have gone into D5 um this
week itself. So, if we can get a report
of that, I think I I think that would be
great. But other than that, thank you
guys so much for all of your hard work
and balancing the budget and making sure
that we can keep majority of our
programs up up and running and continue
to serve um the members of the city of
Phoenix. Thank you.
Thank you, Councilwoman Pastor. Yes. Can
I have the heat relief department?
My understanding is in the reheat relief
arena is that we added um more dollars
to the 247 heat relief space.
Good afternoon, Mayor uh Councilwoman.
Thank you for the question. Uh yes, that
is correct. This year we have increased
resources for many components of the
heat response program, including the 247
site. And the 247 is is where people
will be able to go in to get relief from
heat
um as they're
experiencing uh as they're unsheltered
within our community and they will be
able to be able to cool down, be able to
drink water, maybe possibly
eat. Uh thank you, Councilwoman, Mayor,
and members of the council. The 247 heat
relief site, like all of our cooling
centers, are offered as resources for
the entirety of the public. Uh at the
247 site and at our enhanced sites with
extended hours, our three library
locations with extended hours, we do
have additional services available to
try to help uh connect resources to
other services.
Thank you. And I've gone through my
minutes and in throughout my the minutes
that I highlighted is talking about uh
shade and more trees uh in particular in
Mville and I just want to do a shout out
because I think we've done a really good
job as councilwoman Wardell stated there
are three council people that uh
represent Mville and Mville is at the
height uh is in front of us to be able
to get the resources that they are
um in unprecedented ways that they did
in the past. And so I know that we have
placed many trees throughout
Mville. Am I correct? Am I wrong? Am I I
I'm responding to the comments that were
made. Uh councilwoman, mayor, members of
the council, uh in terms of activities
that the heat office has been involved
with, I think that is absolutely a fair
assessment. Uh I can uh recall a number
of of community tree plantings in Mville
with some of the ARPA resources that
this council has allocated and others.
It certainly has been an area of focus
for our team and there is the ability
for neighborhoods to also get a grant to
put trees in their neighborhood. Uh
there was a grant for schools to put
trees in their uh schools. And then
there was just trees. We had a plan for
uh Mville in order to add additional
trees within those areas plus shade
structures and in this process it also
included parks. Am I I think I'm on
target. Councilwoman, mayor, members of
council, uh yes. Well, I can't speak
specifically to the details of the parks
and recreation department plan. Uh
you're certainly correct with respect to
the the grants uh that our office has
had the privilege to lead that are
supported by the inflation reduction
act. uh programs for neighborhoods. Uh
we encourage residents to visit
phoenix.gov/heat to apply to the
community canopy program, a separate
program for schools as you mentioned,
councilwoman, and we're very excited to
have an opportunity coming very soon uh
for our tree stewards program that will
be an opportunity citywide with a focus
on neighborhoods like Mville. Okay. And
then there is some conversation. We do
have a shade Phoenix plan. there is
conversation or what I've been hearing
and and at uh the the budget hearing
meetings was Mary want Mary Veil wanted
to be included in that plan or be part
of that plan. How is that being
developed with community?
Thank you councilman for the question.
Uh mayor, members of the council, uh we
were fortunate to have the opportunity
for a a wide range of community
engagement in the development of the
shade Phoenix plan. more than 2,000
residents contributed feedback through
different forums, including some
intensive in-person workshops in
different neighborhoods throughout the
city, uh, including including Maryville.
That being said, the Shade Phoenix plan
is a citywide plan. It is not a plan
specific to any one neighborhood or
village. I think there are certainly
opportunities to to go deeper in
engagement with some neighborhoods
moving forward. Okay. So, we have the
ability to go further within the shade
plan.
um and be able then to say here's where
we have identified working with
community.
Councilwoman, I think that's a fair
characterization. Uh we'd love to have
that conversation with our colleagues in
in planning and development,
neighborhood services, and the other uh
departments that are really involved in
that planning conversation with
community. But but yes, I think that's a
fair characterization. Okay. I do want
to and I don't know who where they are
or what. I do want to clarify something
because we did a really good job in
trying to replace our bus stops, our bus
shelters, but we also identified where
there needed to be additional um where
some of the shelter the tops uh were
gone or removed. I want to understand
and there was a whole plan rolled out
and we should be completing that plan. I
want to understand if I'm recalling
correctly and I just the reason why I'm
I'm I'm pausing a bit is because there's
a lot of effort that has been done in
this space and a lot of effort of
maintaining uh what we have done and uh
to hear
that we haven't done anything for Mville
is inaccurate. And so I want to be able
to um
understand such as the bus stops uh and
making sure there's
shade. Mayor, members of the council,
thank you. Uh Councilwoman Pastor, yes,
under the T2050 plan, um our goal is to
do a minimum of 80 new covered stops per
year. And what we've done over the years
is that we have provided updates to city
council to show how we are installing
those. And basically what we do is based
on ridership. So in short, the busier a
bus stop is um the higher up it goes on
our list of stops where we're going to
install shade. Um what we can do is
provide u mayor and city council a
report that shows how we in in my
opinion evenly spread um the amount of
shade that we've done throughout the the
city. We have 4,100 bus stops throughout
the entire city. Right now, if I
remember correctly, we're running about
76 77% of those are covered. And that
percentage is very close within, I would
say, 1 to three percentage points
amongst all the districts citywide. So,
in my opinion, we're doing a very good
job of not only installing shade, again,
a minimum of 80 new ones per year, but
we are also monitoring it very closely
to show, and this is something that
Councilwoman Pastor, you on the Valley
Metro border are are aware of, uh, to
show the feds that we're spreading that
equitably throughout the city. Yes. And
I also want to be able to with my
colleagues uh that represent that area
uh possibly uh work together to look at
that map and and make sure that we're
covering what we need to cover in those
areas of the busy streets in
Mville. So, um that's why I I just
wanted to put that out there. Um if we
could collectively look at it, look at a
map and then make it happen. Um, I
believe that it is happening. Um, but to
be able to demonstrate to the public
where everything is going and how it's
going and how it's been decided. So, uh,
thank you again for answering my
questions. I appreciate it. Thank you,
Councilman Wearing. Thank you, Mayor.
Uh, Jeff and Amber, uh, are there any
new programs, uh, in this budget?
Councilman Wearing, Mayor, members of
the council, the the supplementals for
the general fund is primarily for the
fire department and then the amount the
four and a half million for the office
of homeless solutions. I mean, I guess I
I wasn't speaking like more. Obviously,
we already had a fire department at
homeless. So, I'm sorry. I I guess I
misphrased. We're not adding something
new like oat or something like that,
Councilman. No, that's correct. And you
didn't last year either or we didn't.
That is correct. We did not to the
general. I appreciated that. I voted for
the budget last year and I appreciate I
remember Jeff you sitting in my office
saying that saying you'll be happy and
you were right about that. Um but
obviously increasing personnel costs I
think the city budget is just from
memory is it like 70% personnel
councilman wearing mayor it's higher
than that it's roughly 75% 75% now yeah
so um you know it's if you're going to
give raises and hire more people I mean
it's just it's going to cost money so
you know you talk about health care
costs talk about all the reasons that a
budget would go up um but overall and
over a long period of time you guys I
think have done an excellent job of
managing our money. However, I would
argue we've also added programs that
didn't exist when I started. Quite a few
programs that didn't exist when we
started. You know, I always said we
should focus on police, fire, parks,
libraries, streets. Those are the things
that people associate with. With all due
respect to other programs that were
mentioned, a lot of people, I'll speak
solely really for myself representing
District 2, they're not even going to
know what you're talking about with some
of this. Not saying it's not important,
but it has been added and to some extent
at the expense of other programs that
were sort of sacrosanked when I started.
It was it was a more sort of back to
basics budget when I started and now
we've added a lot of stuff and you know
I was on the losing end of a lot of
those votes. Some of the stuff I
probably supported so I understand. Um,
but the police funding, we're back to
1990s level of policing and whatever
people think about our police, here's
what you get in real life. I'm driving
home from the gym this morning. I'm old
man, so I'm going 40 in the right-hand
lane and somebody passes me like in the
little area between the me going 70. The
chances that that person is going to get
stopped by an officer are almost nil.
Now, that's the practical effect of
going from 3125 or whatever it's
supposed to be officers down to
2485. That's what it looks like. So, the
defund police movement, it won. The
chances that you're going to encounter
an officer, whether you're in trouble or
you're causing trouble or whatever, is
much less. It's our population is going
up. The number of police has gone down
pretty dramatically, pretty quickly.
We're having a hard time replacing them.
There's really no seeming no end to the
site.
So congratulations. I guess if that was
the goal, it's not your fault. That's
where we're at. But I assume, Amber,
let's just say the police budget was a
billion. I assume it would be a lot more
if we actually had 500 more officers and
we were outfitting them and giving them
guns, badges, Taho, the gas to drive
around, you know, all night defending
us. I assume that would be more
expensive. Councilman Wearing, Mayor,
members of the council, we have to
appropriate in the budget the sworn
hiring target. So the sworn hiring
target of 3,125 is fully appropriated in
the budget. Um what I would say to that
is that the the savings that some I
think would think would be there because
of those vacant positions, that savings
does not exist because it's being used
primarily on overtime because we have so
many vacant sworn positions. um as well
as additions that were made to the
budget in the prior three fiscal years
22 through 24 roughly 11 and a half
million that the council approved that
the police department had to absorb in
their budget. So the the money for that
level of sworn filled personnel is
appropriated but because of their
challenge to fill they're having to
utilize the vacancy savings on other
areas of their budget. you anticipated
the genesis of my question. So really we
have spent we're spending a lot less on
police actually out patrolling because
we don't have as many people out there.
There's no way that that may be an
accounting gimmick but it's less people
driving fewer times just less miles
driven less maintenance all that ripple
effect. We have replaced it with uh
bodywn cam. You know, their their budget
has been supplemented with other stuff,
but that doesn't help me when someone's
going 70 by me and you know, it's not
even a lane of traffic because I get
those calls all the time. Um that's just
a thing that we have to deal with.
There's nothing you can do about it. You
guys didn't cause the police hiring
crisis. I'm not blaming you. But to then
say we can't do anything to cut new
programs that didn't even exist 10 years
ago and to cut them 1% or whatever
because we're not really laying anybody
off, are we? Unless you haven't told me,
I know you're shaking your head. We're
not laying anybody off. So nobody's
actually getting cut from the team or
voted off the island. So the personnel
is the same. So those costs are still
going up as you indicated before. So
really, you might be trimming the sales
of stuff that somehow we were doing
without 10, 15 years
ago. Now, we can't do much about the
police. You know, another one that I
think of is how the city looks and the
cleaning of streets and the sides of
streets. I don't know if it's still
true. I don't know if the street
directors or whatever they can say, but
at one point we had more vacancies in
the area that does that work than people
actually going out and do the work
because I know there was discussion
about, you know, are we really going to
trim? Well, I mean, if there's nobody
there to do the work, by definition,
you're trimming the sales. Again, the
trucks aren't going out. You're not
putting as many miles on. You just are
by definition. and that money has been
redirected to other stuff. Um, which you
know isn't necessarily bad, but citizens
should understand that that's what's
been happening drip drip drip over a
period of time with the police. It's
been a cascade, so that's gotten a lot
of attention. Obviously, we have a hard
time
hiring. Um, but that brings me to the
fire department because I understand
that their budget has gone up pretty
dramatically, but I've been harping
about the response times in district 2
for a long time. And and I do appreciate
as thanks to I think Felda Williams,
too. But we worked together to get a
fire station put in district 2, I don't
know, seven, eight years ago. It's
pre-COVID that all kind of blends
together. But just please understand,
you know, I sit up here and I've been
here for a long time and I'm in the
minority. I'm on a wrong end of a lot of
votes or the right end depending on how
you look at it. I just happen to lose.
Um I've watched a lot of new programs
gobbling up city resources. Um I've
watched a big increase in fire spending.
The bond came along which I was fully
prepared to vote for and I talked to the
chief about it at the time both publicly
and privately. I don't know that he
appreciated my cander too much
explaining why district 2 would be a
meritorious place for a new station and
was pretty surprised. And Jeff, I
appreciated that report you gave me.
It's sitting in the trunk of my car. I
probably should have brought it here,
but from memory, I think eight stations
were forwarded to the bond committee and
none of them were in district 2. All the
factors that the fire department talked
about here or the firefighters talked
about here were known then were brought
up by me. I I couldn't understand that.
I couldn't be supportive of that. Even
though I supported other stuff in there,
I understand we need fire stations
elsewhere. I I was frustrated by that.
Then I watch, frankly, we can blame the
legislature, the Republican legislature,
all we want, but who actually cut the
rental tax? There was one person in
Arizona who could have stopped that. Her
name is Governor Hobbs, and she didn't.
So, I know it's fun to blame the
legislature for everything, but Governor
Hobbes actually cut our budget
effectively. So, I'm sitting here
watching this as a Republican. I'm like,
and then I have to hear the only way
you're getting a new fire station is if
you raise
taxes. That's kind of a tough pill to
swallow when you look at it like that.
So, I hope that makes sense. I I think
I'm prepared to be supportive of this,
but I did want to give a counter to some
of the things I've heard here about the
needs of downtown or the needs of other
districts. We have needs,
too. Taxpayers in district two, we're
not all rich. don't allow living, you
know, go to country clubs or whatever.
I've heard it all. But, um, I will say
probably paying the most in taxes too of
the eight districts. And to see stuff be
redirected, programs be redirected away
from the
basics is something that, you know, can
be tough to take, particularly when it
is stuff that's life or death, driving
on your streets, fire response times,
and so forth. So, again, this isn't
directed at you. were the policy makers.
I just thought I'd put out there there
is a different perspective on this. I
don't think we're better off with fewer
police officers. I I think that's been a
bad mistake. And because it's been a bad
mistake, there are fewer police officers
out patrolling to see people who might
be in distress. It can't all be
firefighters responding to
calls. Police officer going and saying,
you know, that person doesn't look well
at that bus stop. That might save heat
related deaths. I do remember, David,
when you gave us a report. I'm not
victim blaming. You tell me how many
also had an issue with drugs that police
officers, last time I checked, they try
to address drug traffic. They try to
stop people from using drugs. Having
fewer of
them makes this problem more prevalent.
I I think sometimes we don't always
connect these
dots. So, I just thought I'd say that. I
don't necessarily expect a response, but
I did want to point out that there might
be a different way of looking at this
and some of our fellow citizens
um might look at these meetings if they
were watching. I don't know how many
people actually watch our meetings. They
they might be interested in this
discussion and say, I think maybe we
should go back to a focus on the things
we were really good at.
So, I appreciate your time. Uh, thank
you as always and thank you mayor for
Thank you. Councilwoman Hernandez.
Thank you, mayor. Um, David, I just have
a quick question or maybe two questions
for you. Um, on the tree situation and
all the comments. First, I want to thank
the community members for showing up and
advocating for Mville. I think it's
super important um for them to be
engaged and involved and continue to
advocate as directly impacted um
community members. Out of the tree
programs and trees that have been
installed under the Phoenix tree tree
plan and the shade plan, do we know do
we get reports on how many of those
trees are now dying because of the
heat? Councilwoman, mayor, members of
the council, thank you for the question.
Our parks and recreation department is
leading uh the update of a new city of
Phoenix tree inventory, which will give
us a modern look at tree survival rates
throughout the city. And as soon as that
inventory is complete with professional
contractors, we'll certainly be happy to
to share all of that that with you.
Awesome. Thank you. And David, I'm going
to assume that you know about the uh
research and data that has shown the
life expectancy
discrepancies specifically in Mville
compared to other areas very
well-invested areas in the city. Um but
for the sake of clarity, I would love to
share that with the residents that don't
know and that are watching. Um, there is
a 14 14-year life expectancy difference
between Mville and North Phoenix. So, I
want to make that clear because I
understand and and I'm glad that the
city has done things and taken measures
to address these um inequities because
we need to call the spade a spade. And I
think it is incumbent on us to get more
creative and go farther and do more for
the residents of Mville considering we
are facing an a life expectancy of 14
years between some of our neighbors. Um
and in the spirit of clarity, I would
actually counter that there's two people
responsible for cutting our budget and
that's President Peterson and Speaker
Bentoma that hijacked the rental tax in
exchange for Prop 400. So, it was a
countywide effect that we were facing.
Um, and so that is the situation that
played out in the legislature that
impacted us. So, thank you, mayor.
Thank you. Does anyone have a final
comment? All right. Well, thank you to
budget research and the city manager for
putting together the budget. And if you
didn't get a chance to comment today,
we'll have four more times, but counting
July 2nd. We are adjourned.
Cut the ribbon.
5 4 3 2 1.
[Applause]
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Hello and welcome to Phoenix in about a
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that, its unique arch