SPOKANE, Wash. — In a press conference at Spokane City Hall Monday, mayoral candidate Lisa Brown accused Mayor Nadine Woodward of mismanaging the city of Spokane's finances.
Brown said Woodward's use of one-time funds for ongoing expenses violates the city's budget principles.
“For three years in a row, this mayor has been depleting the city’s savings account, plugging holes in her budget with one-time funds and spending beyond the City’s means,” Brown said. “Every household in Spokane knows that if you are spending more than your income month after month and depleting your savings account, you will soon be in crisis.”
Brown says that Spokane had $28 million in general fund allocated reserves when Woodward took office in 2020. Now, the mayoral candidate says those reserves have been "drastically reduced" below levels required by city ordinance due to Woodward's "mismanagement" and "lack of planning."
In a statement, Brown said the structural deficit could be as high as $12 to $15 million in 2024.
"Without a course correction, it will be impossible to keep commitments already made to service levels," Brown said.
"We provide a balanced budget every year, we have for the first three years of my term," Woodward said in her response to Brown. "We're working on a balanced budget for 2024."
Mayor Woodward acknowledges the city's rainy day fund is not where it should be. However, she says Brown is forgetting some important details.
"We've had to use some of those reserves," Woodward said. "She may have forgotten we went through a pandemic when everything was locked down and we weren't getting revenues because businesses weren't operating. A lockdown that she enthusiastically supported."
"The challenge we have right now with the budget, I'll just tell you, is police overtime," Woodward continued. "Definitely we have a challenge with police overtime and sustainable funding for homelessness. Homeless funding is not sustainable, those are grants, those are one-time dollars that have to be renewed every year, you never know if you are going to get the same amount next year as we did this year."
In her response, Mayor Woodward says Brown is trying to take attention away from her record when it comes to the budget at the state legislature.
"She's been a career politician for 30 years and in order for her to balance budgets, she raises taxes," Woodward said.
Brown's full speech can be viewed below:
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