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have $4.1 million in reserves. That money can come from postponing capital improvements. We have over $50 million, I think, in capital improvements. The money cannot come from enterprise funds, that use to be the old shell game before Proposition 13. They have to be completely separated, water, sewer, etc. We cannot play games with those funds. But we have that latitude as any board of directors in a corporation has, to give orders to staff if we find we need to increase services in a specific area like the police department. I agree with Councilman Leipzig in some respects, that we don't revisit the budget that many times during the process of a year. But I think that if the need arises that any Council Member or any member of the public feels we should be spending funds in a different area, we certainly have that latitude. A budget is not, again, chiseled in stone. It is a planning tool and can be modified any Monday night this Council wishes to modify it. And funds can be moved to other programs if the majority of Council feels it is important." Council Member Leipzig said the time to review was at the study session and also before the vote is taken. "I don't believe the time to review is every Monday night during the year. That is not sound planning. Planning is sitting down, putting together a budget, and sticking to it. Asking the public to come and give their comments on projects is important. To ask the public to micro manage the budget is not the responsibility of the public. That's our responsibility to make sure we manage the budget. I think we disagree on the process, but I haven't been shown any plan for dealing with this report that will come and might cost us one million dollars. It could come in within the next 30 days. I think knowing that, we would plan a little bit for it. To dip into a $4.1 million reserve to take out one quarter of that to hire police officers I don't think is sound fiscal management. Mayor Hartnett said, "I don't know what the police staffing report is going to say. But I do know that if we, as a Council, decide to increase the number of police officers, taking that as an example with respect to planning, the day we decide to increase the number of staff is not the day we spend our first dollar. There is planning in connection with increasing staff, once you decide how many you are going to add. The practical matter is, we can authorize the hiring of ten additional police officers today, and the budget consequences of that in terms of actual expenditures would be felt significantly out into the future. You don't get ten on the payroll when you decide to get them. You start a process of recruitment, and it is a fairly comprehensive process. I understand Councilman Leipzig's point, not just with respect to the police issue, but others as well. I think we have had as a Council, a full opportunity to do what we want with the budget in terms of establishing Council priorities. We have instructed the staff what we want in terms of Council priorities. They have brought us a budget that reflects the Council's priorities, and they spent a lot of hours in their budget endeavors to make sure that they could plan to accomplish the priorities that this very Council has set. I think the two-year budget we adopted and the second year we are ratifying by the introduction of the Ordinance reflects substantial planning by the staff to accomplish the goals that the majority of the Council has set. I've been particularly impressed by the eagerness of REGULAR COUNCIL MEETING MINUTE BOOK NO. 55 JULY 14,1997 MINUTES Page No. 450 PAGE 13