Thursday, August 6, 2026, 10 a.m. (Austin time), Austin City Hall
The Austin City Council held a budget work session on the City Manager's proposed fiscal year 2026-27 budget, hearing dozens of public speakers. Most asked the council to keep the Austin Police Department budget flat, fully fund social services, move 9-1-1 out of APD, expand storage for unhoused people and stop encampment sweeps, while others asked for spending restraint, supported the police budget, or sought funding for Capital IDEA, Farmshare and other programs. Budget staff presented a revised plan for the additional $4.7 million in property tax revenue that moves the local housing voucher program onto recurring general fund money and makes $4.75 million in one-time funds available for social services; Council Member Fuentes said she would withdraw her own restoration amendment. Members then laid out proposed amendments and budget riders without voting on them, including a standalone emergency communications office (Siegel), an office of joint emergency communications (Laine), $32 million in certificates of obligation for active transportation (Vela), an ACME temporary staffing reduction and a speed hump fund (Alter), and Violet KeepSafe storage (Siegel); budget votes are scheduled for August 12-14. The council then unanimously adopted ordinances calling November 3, 2026 elections for Council Districts 1, 3, 5, 8 and 9, parks and library bond propositions A and B, and charter amendment propositions C through J, including a citizen-initiated amendment, in the order legal staff recommended.
0:09 You're watching a meeting of the Austin City Council with Mayor Kirk Watson, Mayor Pro Tem Chito Vela,
0:20 council members Natasha Harper Madison, Vanessa Fuentes, José velazquez, Ryan
0:30 Alter, Krista lane, Mike Siegel, Paige Ellis,
0:41 zoe cowdrey, mark duchin, city attorney deborah thomas, city
0:50 clerk erica brady and city manager t.c. Broadnax.
1:01 Good morning everybody. It's 10:00 in the morning on August 6th, 2026.
1:07 I'll call to order the City Council meeting of the Austin City Council. We have a quorum of the City Council present, and we are meeting in City Council chambers located at City Hall at 301 west second street
1:18 in Austin, texas. Members, we have a number of items on the agenda today.
1:25 What I intend to do is. And by the way, yes, there's a new proposed amendment that I'm seeking co-sponsors.
1:34 I call this the whatever it takes amendment. Yeah. And we take money from wherever we can, including if it wipes out most of our other proposed amendments.
1:44 So, so we can, we can do that. Anyway. Having said that what we'll do is we'll go in the order of the agenda,
1:53 except when we get to items two and four as I put on the message board yesterday, items two and four might might very well.
2:04 I want to get a feeling from the council about how we want to do that before we take the amendment,
2:09 and we might take up for before we take up 2 or 2 before we take up four, because that deals with the ordering of the items on the agenda.
2:16 But we'll we'll talk about that in more detail when we get there. As I always do, I want to point out what our schedule is. Today, of course, we have this budget work session. We have the other agenda items. And then on Wednesday, August 12th, we will be scheduled to have the,
2:35 the first opportunity to vote on the budget Thursday, August 13th and Friday, August 14th.
2:42 We will also conduct public hearing and have council discussion and the council vote on those days.
2:47 I just want to make sure that everybody's aware of what what the schedule is. Having said that, let us now go to item number one, which is posted as a presentation and discussion of the city manager's fiscal year 2026 2027 proposed budget.
3:00 And we will start with speakers and I'll turn to the city clerk. When the city clerk calls your names. Many of you have already been here and know how this operates.
3:09 But let me say it again. And for those that are new, she'll call out the names in batches of three,
3:14 4 or 5, maybe more. When your name is called, please come forward when your name is called and go ahead and take a seat if a seat is
3:21 available. If a seat is not available at the desk, take one of these front row seats and that way we'll know you're here and we can
3:28 efficiently hear your testimony. So with that, I'll turn to the city clerk. Thank you Mayor. I have a few remote speakers for item one, catherine mcardle.
3:41 Good morning. My name is catherine mcardle. I live in district nine, and I'm here today to again ask you to keep the police budget flat.
3:48 Do not give apd a penny more than required by that ridiculous texas law. No excuses about the cost of that new police union contract some of you voted for in 2024.
3:58 Find other ways to cut the budget down to the minimum required can be done if you all have the courage and the backbone to do it,
4:05 especially in the wake of yet another police killing. Do not reward them for that. I'm glad that there has been some discussion on using new property tax revenue to fund social services contracts.
4:15 Thank you for this initial effort. However, even if it becomes reality, it is not enough.
4:20 It is not enough because there is a greater need than to just maintain the existing social services contracts.
4:26 We need to grow social services provision in the city. We desperately need more services to support our unhoused neighbors. We need more food access. We need more mental health support. We need more childcare support. I could go on, but you already know these things, and you've been hearing for weeks from so many in the
4:41 community about these needs, and it's so obvious that you could fund these needs by taking the proposed $25 million increase to apd and instead providing these additional social
4:50 services. The things that will actually keep our community safe and thriving rather than killing our neighbors.
4:56 And you all know that any money given to apd this year, above its current budget is money that cannot be used next year for literally anything
5:03 else. And we'll be right back here next year fighting against more proposed cuts to the social services we need.
5:09 I also ask that this budget enables moving the 911 dispatch out from apd and into an independent emergency communications department that can make the correct judgment calls
5:18 on which type of first responder to send. We know that with 911 under apd, they send police officers for so many calls where another type of responder would be more
5:26 appropriate and safer. We've seen how damaging this police department is.
5:31 Please make it just a little less damaging by keeping their budget flat and moving 911 to an independent department.
5:37 Thank you. Jen powell. Good morning. Today it
5:46 seems to be my last day to yell about the budget and to see it, I'm just going to keep it simple as everyone else has been saying.
5:54 Fund the cib in full. Also social services, fundamental or I guarantee all the next round of yelling is just going to be people asking for a
6:04 detailed educational and equity impact statement before implementation to make sure these cuts aren't as disproportionately targeted at schools and persecuted social
6:14 groups as they look on paper, because it doesn't look good on paper.
6:19 Now that funding does include the funding for the safe alliance and full and continuing the contracts with them,
6:24 which I see that you guys have done a lot of the legwork on, and I appreciate that. You can enter into a contract with brave up in cedar park as well. I get that, but that should be an additional contract and not a replacement. Now here's the mean part. After the murder of antonio.
6:41 You guys know that you can't go through with the proposed raises for apd.
6:46 Just keep the budget flat. And in the meantime, focus on two important matters one, moving the 911 call center out of apd and into some
6:55 sort of civilian structure. Everybody should know that pretty much the whole council supports that.
7:02 It's just that we need whoever in the city to finish pushing to get it done.
7:07 So please finish pushing to get it done. And then two, require that both the police and the civilian dispatchers actually take the suicide by cop
7:15 prevention training. It does exist. People have begged them. I don't even know how many times or for how long to do it. But you definitely cannot justify increasing the apd funding to any of your constituents until they actually take that training.
7:28 If they pay attention, they might actually reduce up to 30% of killings that can be attributed to that cause.
7:35 And last but not least, while you're in there, if you could give the civilian oversight committee actual teeth,
7:41 financial teeth, when police handle a case correctly, they can incentivize, incentivize.
7:48 And when they said. Good morning, Mayor and council.
7:56 My name is neil patel. I'm a physician who provides care through Austin safety net health system. I treat people who are unhoused, people living in poverty, and people whose health and dignity are directly harmed by the current practice of
8:07 encampment sweeps. I'm speaking here as a clinician who sees the consequences of these policies.
8:12 My patients lose their medications because of the suites and end up hospitalized with serious illness that could have been avoided.
8:18 I care for people who have lost their ids and housing paperwork and sweeps, and then can't access shelter or benefits.
8:24 These are our neighbors. Our clinical and social support teams are exhausted from picking up after the disasters that these sweeps cause in our patients lives,
8:33 working countless hours, helping clients get new ideas and investing hours of care. Helping people recover from preventable injury and illness due to these sweeps. I work through the pandemic and I will say these policies pushed forward by council are causing as much moral injury to our staff as the covid pandemic did.
8:50 The public health evidence is clear forced displacement, sweeps, confiscation and involuntary relocation worsens health outcomes,
8:57 increases overdose risk, interrupts continuity of care, destroys essential belongings, and drives people further from services.
9:05 Sweeps harm health and do not produce durable exits from homelessness. Beyond the human toll, sweeps are fiscally irresponsible. They are expensive to conduct shift costs to emergency care and hospitals, and fail to reduce homelessness.
9:19 The city budget is a moral document. As you finalize austin's budget, you have a responsibility to invest in what actually improves health, reduces harm and
9:25 enhances public safety. You have an immediate opportunity to act. First, stop these harmful sweeps, costly sweeps that displace people and destroy the fragile continuity of care.
9:35 Second, expand the city's safe storage program. Safe storage reduces harm by preserving medications, ids, and housing documents when people are moved.
9:43 While storage is not a complete solution, it is a concrete harm reduction step. Our unhoused neighbors have repeatedly requested. Third, keep the a p d budget flat. Do not increase funding for policing at the expense of social services.
9:56 And fourth, restore and prioritize funding for. That's all the remote speakers I have for item one. So I'm going to be moving to in-person speakers philip fitzgerald,
10:06 savannah lee, rebecca webber, shelby evans, elliot trahan.
10:14 If your name has been called, please come forward. And all we ask is that when you begin your testimony, you state your name for the record. Mr.
10:23 Fitzgerald, we'll begin with you. You said we're going to start with me.
10:28 Sure. Okay. Philip fitzgerald, district one. So I originally wanted to come to, you know,
10:34 talk about more things than just this, but obviously with shortened time, I'll just get with this.
10:41 Yeah. Growing up, I used to have a coach that would always tell us stories about what's required to be a leader.
10:47 And he would often reference the harming of of, you know, women and children and said, if you ever did that,
10:53 he wouldn't have forgiveness for you. But I think he also missed including old folks.
11:00 And part of this budget calls for the cutting of the senior congregant meal program, which I've emailed some of you about.
11:05 It's a program that runs across our city and no other area, but district one has, has, has more service locations than district one.
11:15 In talking with some of the staff at these locations, they, they feed over 100 seniors in Austin a day.
11:22 I think this cut would be a serious attack on that area on an area that for far too long has had to play catch up with other districts in Austin.
11:32 You know, district one has former teachers and restaurant workers and veterans. And I know a lot of you have a good understanding of what those people have given our city,
11:41 but I think it's also important to understand how little they've been given in return. And I understand that we're we're over budget.
11:48 We're not to make cuts, but we cannot sacrifice our seniors. This program offers them an ability to leave their homes and reach out and establish and maintain community.
11:59 Which is a warm blanket for a lot of people at a time in their life when they're often isolated.
12:05 So please take a look at this budget again and find something else to cut.
12:09 I have a little more time, obviously with the news of greg abbott. He's, he's going to push to deregulate Austin energy that's going to blow a hole in our general fund.
12:17 So if people are upset about the cutting of social services now, wait until we lose $100 million.
12:22 And I really would would ask that the city start preparing for that now. And that means reaching out to people in san antonio and figure out how we're going to defend our city. Thank you.
12:31 Thank you. Why don't we go with you and then we'll work down the row.