Westfield Mayor Brian Sullivan (WNG file photo)
WESTFIELD–Mayor Brian Sullivan has gotten a head-start on the upcoming budget, with the hopes of being “totally transparent.”
Sullivan asked for the budget requests of all the departments in the city to be in this week, in what he termed as the “first round of budgets.” Sullivan expects to have the numbers of the requests in about two weeks, and wants to both be able to get the budget in quicker than last year and allow people to see the budget process in action.
“We’re starting this process earlier to be totally transparent with how it all goes together,” Sullivan said. “This is just a starting point.”
Sullivan is hopeful that with this earlier start, he can get the budget to Westfield city council’s finance subcommittee by late April or early May. He is also hoping to see the budget rise at least some.
“Hopefully, a slight increase is what I’m looking for,” he said. “The cost of doing business in the city is increasing.”
However, Sullivan does not necessarily anticipate such an increase is coming. Just in case, he has asked those in charge of budgets to find different ways that money could be saved.
“I’ve asked department heads to do a deep management of their budgets to find unique ways to save money,” he said.
He also said that there could be some cost-saving measures done through an attrition of the city’s municipal workforce. This would mostly be through retirements and positions being left open in the city but Sullivan said it would not include termination of employees.
