The all-important “Round 2” meeting of the budget committee is taking place now. You can watch it live here. The council chambers are packed with citizens who wanted to speak on behalf of specific budget items, and committee chair Licata expanded the public comment section of the meeting from 10 minutes to a full hour. It’s very clear that Council member Sawant’s calls for people to show up and speak were heard — many people spoke in favor of more funding for the homelessness issue, affordable housing, 12 weeks of parental leave, municipal broadband, and other items in Sawant’s progressive agenda.
The full list of budget items, with item detail, to be addressed is here. The agenda is here.
I will post a summary of the meeting, with a pointer to the video archive, tonight.
Keep in mind that this is a process-heavy meeting: first they need to decide which items to place on the agenda for discussion (by amending the agenda), then they need to actually discuss and vote on adding each of those items to the budget. If you’re watching, expect it to be slow progress.