Vincentgraybudgetsastatement 4-23-09

COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE – BSA PUBLIC HEARING APRIL 23, 2009 Good morning, I would like to welcome everyone, and hereby call to order today’s Committee of the Whole public hearing on B18203, the “Fiscal Year 2010 Budget Support Act of 2009”. Today is Thursday, April 23, 2009.....Today we will hear testimony from the public and the executive branch. The Office of the Chief Financial Officer will be available to answer questions but will not be testifying….

I would like to use my opening remarks to not take a position on any specific subtitles of the Budget Support Act but instead, to speak about the Act in general terms. The Budget Support Act was originally developed to include all of the legal changes that were needed to transfer, increase, or decrease funding within the Mayor’s proposed budget to ensure that it was balanced. The Budget Support Act would accompany the Budget Request Act.

In some prior years, the Council has included subtitles in the Budget Support Act that were not budget-related.

I plan to

continue the trend from last year by enforcing a relatively rigorous standard for subtitles to be germane and necessary to balance the

budget. Any subtitle that is not budget-related will be stricken regardless of its merit.

I believe, as a general matter, that it is preferable for an individual piece of legislation to be separately noticed, experience the scrutiny of a public hearing, and move forward on its own merits to provide greater thought and transparency during the legislative process.

As in prior years, the Committees have been assigned comments on Budget Support Act subtitles that fall under their legislative jurisdiction. Generally, the recommendations of the Committees are given great weight at the Committee of the Whole level, in reliance upon a Committee’s expertise in the subject area. This year, we will continue to look to the expertise of our Committees in deliberating how to proceed with each Budget Support Act subtitle.