CHICAGO CITY HALL (WBBM Newsradio) -- Some Chicago aldermen have called a special meeting of the full City Council for next Monday, November 10, to get answers to questions they say Mayor Brandon Johnson's office won't provide about a report on potential savings in next year's budget.
Roscoe Village alderman Scott Waguespack, Matt O'Shea from Beverly and Samantha Nugent from Albany Park joined seven colleagues Monday in filing a request with the City Clerk's office for a special meeting to ask analysts from the accounting firm Ernst and Young about a report the city commissioned on possible efficiencies in the Johnson Administration's spending plan for next year.
Waguespack (32nd Ward) said the city's agreed to pay EY at least $3.2 million for the report, but the mayor's budget team reportedly has no plans to release the full report to the public: "We were told that the administration would essentially redact that document and pick and choose what they wanted to come out in the public."
Nugent (39th Ward) said at a time when the city is looking for ways to close a budget gap estimated to be $1.2 billion, transparency is important: "The people of Chicago deserve to know how their money is being spent - and why."
Leaders of the Johnson Administration have been meeting with City Council members since October 21 to go over the mayor's $16.6 billion spending plan, but the aldermen calling for a special session say the mayor's team have provided few details about some of the most controversial planks, including the 21-dollar per person per month head tax on big business ... which the mayor is calling the "Community Safety Surcharge"... and the proposed tax on social media companies.
"The people we represent are fed up," said O'Shea (19th Ward), who added the mayor's office had planned on a budget vote before Thanksgiving, and suggested such a vote would be difficult unless more information was given to aldermen.
Mayor Johnson's office released a statement which includes a link to the EY proposal. A spokesperson also says aldermen have been briefed on the recommendations that were included in the budget report, and said the office has been working with City Council to schedule a hearing on the EY report since last week.