Mayor announces veto of 10 municipal jobs added by council

Mayor Linda Gorton today announced her veto of 10 new municipal positions that the Urban County Council added to the city budget.

“I cannot support the precedent set by this increase in our projected revenues by $750,000 without justification, to add recurring costs in the 10 new positions approved by Council,” Gorton said. “I don’t want to make choices today that could force us to raise taxes in the years to come.”

Gorton said that in developing its fiscal year 24-25 budget plan, the administration “carefully considered” requests for new positions. “My team and I approached this budget with a desire to do as much good as possible with the guiding principle that we would protect taxpayers and the long-term financial health of the City,” Gorton said. “We evaluated every expense, including recurring expenses and the potential impact they would have on future budgets. We carefully reviewed the new position requests and, although there were many good ones, not funded within my budget, I felt we needed to make sure we were living within our means.

In the budget it adopted, Council made “some very valuable contributions that will help our residents in many ways,” Gorton said. “Overall, I greatly appreciated the Council’s careful deliberations and thoughtfulness in this budget process.

Under Gorton’s leadership, Lexington was ranked among the best financially managed cities in the country.

Each year, Lexington bases its revenue estimate on a recommendation from a team of economists. Based on this revenue projection, the Mayor presented her initial budget plan to Council on April 16. After reviewing its recommendations, Council gave final approval to its budget with increased spending at its June 13 meeting.

“Arbitrarily increasing a revenue estimate so you can spend more is not a good budgeting practice,” Gorton said. “This leads to overspending, especially when it comes to recurring expenses. I’m taking a more cautious approach.

The mayor has a line item veto, meaning she can veto certain expenses included in the budget. If the Council decides to override its veto, it should take this action before the end of the fiscal year (June 30) to ensure that a final budget is in place. A priority vote requires the support of nine Council members.

Gorton’s predecessor, Jim Gray, and Foster Pettit, the first mayor of Lexington’s merged government, are the only other mayors to veto items in the budget.