The Minneapolis City Council voted Wednesday to look deeper into the financial reporting of Mayor Jacob Frey’s administration after the two clashed over the council’s recent decision to make budget cuts to save a downtown homeless shelter.
Frey accused the council of making a rash decision to make mid-year budget cuts to find $1.5 million to fund repairs to prevent a homeless shelter from permanently closing. Some council members, in turn, accused the Frey administration of retaliating by cutting funding for a North Side park project.
Agate Housing and Services’s century-old building at 510 S. 8th St. was slated to permanently close Oct. 9 due to plumbing and other problems. On Sept. 19, the council stepped in and voted 10-3 to cut $1.5 million from various city departments and direct the savings to Agate, contingent on Agate finding matching funds to come up with $3 million. An anonymous donor has since agreed to put up the matching money.
Agate still plans to close temporarily Oct. 9 to allow for construction.
“The $1.5 million you set aside is not free money. It must come from somewhere,” Frey wrote to the council on Sept. 26.
Deputy City Operations Officer Saray Garnett-Hochuli said in an email to the council that its decision to cut $1.5 million from the 2024 remaining operating budget was based on quarterly budget projections, which are fluid and don’t take into account things such as filling vacancies in the second half of the year. She said their decision would require the city to suspend job classification studies, subscriptions to LinkedIn and Indeed and participation in all job fairs and recruiting events. Most controversial was a $350,000 cut to funding for North Commons Park, a 1970s-era community center and water park that the Minneapolis Park Board plans to renovate and expand for $35 million.
The decision to cut North Commons funds incensed some council members, who vowed to restore the funding. Council Member Jason Chavez called it a retaliatory budget cut that will hurt the North Side, and Council Vice President Aisha Chughtai said tax dollars shouldn’t be used as a tool for political retaliation.
Frey told council members the only alternative was to lay off city employees.