Proposed FY 2019/2020 Budget Slides Through Mesa City Council

The City of Mesa News Room sure got this one out fast!

Mesa approves
2019-2020 fiscal year budget
June 3, 2019 at 7:36 pm
. . . and all done in about 15 minutes! The first person to speak up at the Public Hearing was Verl Farnsworth, who raised objections to how the city administration spends and for what. The streaming video is inserted before the text of the press release. Please take the time to listen before you get more of that murky feel-good over-blown political rhetoric
Ref: Public article 2326 from Mesanow.org 
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SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING > PUBLIC HEARING
Uploaded to YouTube: 03 June 2019
Views: 95 [as of Fri 07 June 7th at 07:00 a.m.]
Please note how this gets set up for public consumption by both Hizzoner John Giles and City Manager Chris Brady, who obviously have been given talking-points.
By the way, how did the City Council vote?

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(Blogger Note: Images are inserted for editorial comment)
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 Choice of words: How many times if public safety repeated?

"Continuing its emphasis on public safety, improved infrastructure and innovation, today, the Mesa City Council approved the fiscal year 2019-20 budget of $1.8 billion, an amount consistent with the previous year's adopted budget. Correction: $1.83-billion

"Mesa's budget is a reflection of our residents' feedback, Council priorities, and conservative financial modeling and forecasting." Mesa Mayor John Giles said. "I'm pleased with our strategic budgeting process which resulted in public safety as a top priority and the implementation of the new public safety sales tax, which adds more staffing for both police and fire services."
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HOLD ON! New taxes again? "PUBLIC SAFETY" is the smoke-screen in the city's sales-pitch to sell anything to taxpayers.
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The budget includes approximately $184.8 million in new voter-approved bond funding as well as $79.5 million in existing authorizations for public safety, infrastructure and parks/cultural capital projects. Examples of these projects include the Greenfield Water Treatment Plant, Fire Station 221 and upgrades to the Dobson Ranch Library and the Main Library. Public Safety additions since the approval of last year's budget and going into FY 2019-20, are more than $7.1 million including funding for 40 positions for Police and 25 positions for Fire/Medical both sworn and civilian. . .
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< Readers of this blog might like to note that the Mesa Police Union has no confidence in the Police Chief, selected by City Manager Chris Brady two years. There's a revolt in the ranks. They want the Mesa City Council to fire him.
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IS MESA A "SMART CITY" ???

"As an organization, we continue to focus on ways to use Smart City technology and other innovations to not only improve the delivery of our services but also find ways to be more efficient in the process."
City Manager Chris Brady said.
"The general governmental fund, which is the funding mechanism for our daily operations, increased slightly from $445 million in FY 2018-19 to $457.7 million in this year's budget with a majority of that going to public safety."

The City of Mesa's financials including general obligation and utility revenue bonds are strong according to both Moody's and Standard & Poor (S&P) Global credit rating agencies with S&P raising their long-term rating to AA from AA- and Moody's maintaining their Aa2 rating

For more information about Mesa's budget, bond program and ratings visit www.mesaaz.gov/city-hall/office-of-management-budget.