Open Budget Meetings Letter 072409

Friends and colleagues, Next week, the DC Council will hold two marathon — but private — sessions to come up with a plan to close a major budget gap. Each Council member has been asked to bring to those meetings ideas for cutting up to 12% of the budgets of the agencies they oversee. Those full-Council meetings should be open to the public, so that residents can have a

chance to weigh in on key decisions that will affect their lives. Please sign-on to the letter below to show your support for an open DC government. SIGN ON TO THE LETTER BELOW BY CLOSE-OF-BUSINESS FRIDAY — AND PASS THE LETTER ON TO YOUR DISTRIBUTION NETWORK (We apologize for the very short notice) To sign on, please email [email protected]. Include organizational name if signing on as a group. Please include individual name and the ward of residence if signing on as an individual. TEXT OF LETTER July 24, 2009 The Honorable Vincent C. Gray Chairman, District of Columbia Council 1350 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Suite 504 Washington, DC 20004 Dear Council Chairman Gray: We, the undersigned organizations, are writing to request that you make open to the public the Council’s budget deliberations that will occur during the week of July 27. We believe that making all full-Council sessions accessible to the public is critical to having an open and transparent government in the District of Columbia. It is our understanding that the DC Council will meet as a whole on Monday July 27 and Tuesday July 28 to work out budget and revenue decisions to address the District’s budget shortfall. Those decisions will have a major impact on the services received by DC residents and on the taxes they pay. If the meetings are not open, it is likely that the public will not be aware of the decisions before the July 31 vote. This means that residents will not have an opportunity to offer insight and feedback on critical budget decisions that the Council will make. The Council currently allows members of the media to attend these kinds of meetings. Accommodating members of the public should be possible, as well. We thank you for considering this matter.