Report to Mayor and City Council
Tuesday, March 19, 2019
Consent
SUBJECT:
Title
FISCAL REPORT ON IMPACT ON THE CITY'S GENERAL FUND RELATED TO CITY ATTORNEY SERVICES FOR YEARS 2015, 2016, 2017, AND 2018 (CITY COUNCIL)
Body
I. SUMMARY
This item was originally on the agenda at the request of Councilwoman Davis-Holmes and appeared on the February 5, 2019 agenda. The original request was for an accounting of the impacts on the City's General Fund due to the City Attorney's services for the last fiscal year. The February 5 report provided information for the last 2 fiscal years.
However, at the meeting, Council provided a page from the City's Fiscal Year 2015-2016 Certified Annual Financial Report (CAFR) that showed a $12,000,000 cost allocated to the City Attorney for that fiscal year. Naturally, such a large number raised concerned among the Council and with the City Attorney, since it represented a four- or five-fold larger City Attorney "budget" than in any typical fiscal year. Considering this line item to be the same as the City Attorney budget would be a mistake, as an incorrect amount would have been allocated to the City Attorney budget. In the CAFR, the "City Attorney" line item includes not just legal fees but judgments and other legal exposure as well.
The City Attorney's actual budget impact on the General Fund for Fiscal Year 2015-2016 was $2,400,000. However, in that year the City faced the exposure of nearly $8,000,000 in the Colony Cove litigation because of a verdict in Federal District Court; as a result, the Council had set aside money from the reserves for this litigation in case the City would ultimately lose. This money was never spent. Moreover, it should was never been allocated to the City Attorney budget; rather, it would have been spent directly pay off a judgment. Fortunately, the Colony Cove case is over and the United States Supreme Court has ruled in the City's favor and the $8,000,000 has since been returned to the rese...
Click here for full text