Zuckerman: ’rewriting history’
City Attorney disputes Danielson claim
MANDEVILLE — The City Council rejected a measure that would have amended the current operating budget adopted in July to strike certain historical fund balance information that critics of the proposal say provides context into the formulation of the annual budget.
Ordinance 24-07 — authored by Councilman at Large Rick Danielson, a recent budget critic of Mayor Clay Madden — would have amended Ordinance 23-27 to replace a pre-audit fund balance report, referred to as “Exhibit H,” with a post-audit version that contains the latest fund balance figures.
The pre-audit version of Exhibit H relied on best-data available at the time the budget was introduced and adopted, offering historical insight to the basis for the administration’s financial planning in 2023. The post-audit version contains the corrected balances based on the results of the annual February 2024 audit.
Councilman at Large Jason Zuckerman said, “I just don’t like going back and rewriting history… I wouldn’t be opposed to adding it as an update, but why take out what we considered when we adopted the budget… I think we ought to leave in there what we had at the time when we considered the budget.”
Danielson has been pushing for this kind of measure for several months now, including during the lead-up to the March 23 primary election.
District I Councilwoman Rebecca Bush asked, “Why do we have to change the budget?”
Zuckerman again chimed in, saying, “Why do we have to replace what we did nine months ago? Why don’t we just publish an update to it? I just don’t know why we need an ordinance for this.”
Danielson fired back, saying, “I can tell you why you need an ordinance, because it would be an adjustment to the budget.”
Danielson told the council that City Attorney Elizabeth Sconzert advised him that a budget adjustment would be required.
However, Sconzert quickly disputed Danielson’s assertion: “The question was, can we replace it and how would we do it. How would we replace Exhibit H. And the response was, you would have to amend the budget.”
After a few more rounds of back-and-forth and before calling for the vote, Zuckerman asked Finance Director Kathleen Sides to provide the updated, post-audit version of Exhibit H to the Finance section of the City website so that the public can view both versions.
Ordinance 24-07 was rejected 3-2, with Zuckerman, Bush and District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire voting against, and Danielson and District II Councilman Dr. Skelly Kreller voting in favor.
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Mandeville Daily 