United States Common Sense is a non-profit, non-partisan policy group dedicated to opening government data and resources to the public, developing data-driven policy analysis, and educating citizens about how their governments work. 
Did you notice that D1 Councilmember Mark Freeman is getting a lot of "face time" on these screen-grab image uploads to YouTube from Mesa Channel 11? 
At the same time - 07:30 in the morning - there are also two other meetings of the City Council calendar dealing with Eastmark, a CFD (Community Facilities District), that usually get scant scrutiny or attention with everything approved in about five minutes.
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It was released only just the day before!
To take action on and to Hear a presentation, discuss, and provide direction on the following three department budgets:
1. Water Resources
2. Environmental Management and Sustainability
3. Energy Resources
Don't know about you, dear readers, but your MesaZona is very curious to find out exactly how much time each of the six City Councilmembers and the mayor took to read and to understand what's in the lengthy presentations for these three city departments. . . .
You are presented with only what city officials want you to see for the purpose of getting the proposed budgets in three departments approved, with a minimum of hassles or questions.
Please keep your eyes open and pay attention to what the six individual councilmembers, the mayor, and salaried city officials have to say to either question or praise projects and if the presenters need some support to clear up the questions asked. . . .
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This is five years after Chris Brady, former assistant city manager from San Antonio, TX, was hired as the City Manager here in Mesa in 2005.
The debt obligation at that time was about $40M. Last year 2018 it was over $450M.
Yes, Mesa is growing fast, but is it smart and sustainable??
Budgets are complicated to say the very least and anyone reasonable person might ask if councilmembers are smart and informed enough to examine the proposed budgets.
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Here's the 2-Page Agenda made public just the day before . . . No doubt that it would take a team of qualified and diligent financial analysts for than just a day and more than just a few hours to go over a total of 67 pages, in the format of Power Point slides, and to review and understand and analyze the proposed budget figures for the upcoming Fiscal Year for File #19-0372 where the attachments and links are provided below after this overview taken from downloads of the materials to be presented. 
Furthermore, there are few elected members on the Mesa City Council with a business and finance background who can realistically wrap their heads around the proposed budgets for their own districts - never mind the impacts citywide. And that's even if they were the time in the first place to access all the data and commentary provided in the slides. Smart?
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Hear a presentation, discuss, and provide direction on the following department budgets:
[27 pages]
Environmental Management & Sustainability Department
Budget Presentation April 18, 2019
Presented by: Scott Bouchie, Environmental Management & Sustainability Dept. Director
[17 pages]
FY 19/20 BUDGET REVIEW
PROVIDE SAFE, RELIABLE & ECONOMICAL ELECTRIC & NATURAL GAS UTILITY SERVICES TO OUR CUSTOMERS
Presented by Frank McRae and John Petrof
[23 pages]
| File #: | 19-0372 |
| Type: | Presentation | Status: | Agenda Ready |
| In control: | City Council Study Session |
| On agenda: | 4/18/2019 |
| Title: | Hear a presentation, discuss, and provide direction on the following department budgets: 1. Water Resources 2. Environmental Management and Sustainability 3. Energy Resources |
| Attachments: | 1. Water Resources 2. Environmental Management and Sustainability 3. Energy Resources |
Other business
2 Hear reports on meetings and/or conferences attended.
3 Scheduling of meetings and general information.
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Source for Meeting Agendas: Legistar Calendar/Council, Committe & Board Research Center
Here's the 3-Hour streaming video - Please note once again many views in a city with a population ov over 475,000 have viewed what our city government is doing:
Published on Apr 19, 2019
Views: 5
