Politics

DC Mayor Launches Last Minute Money Grab With New Budget Proposal

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District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser launched a last-minute effort to secure more money for projects she’s been working on in the 2016 budget.

Bowser announced a supplemental budget Tuesday asking for an extra $23 million for use in FY 2016 on jobs programs and crime fighting initiatives.

Those jobs programs include a plan to provide 20 to 24 year olds in the city job training and a public works academy that helps residents get jobs with the city government.

“The expanded program will include good paying jobs at District agencies that provide vital services for residents,” Bowser said in a letter to city residents.

The “good paying jobs” Bowser refers to will be as garbage men, The Washington Post reports. The city will pay $2.3 million to place 50 people in jobs at the Department of Public Works.

Bowser will submit the budget to the city council as emergency legislation. The council will have little time to discuss the measure before it votes because the supplemental budget uses funds from the current fiscal year, which have to be spent before Oct. 1 when FY 2016 begins.

That gives the city council just 10 days to discuss and make any changes to Bowser’s request for extra money before holding a vote and sending it back to Bowser to sign.

The money will be used to help residents pay for security cameras and to hire new employees at recreation centers, FOX 5 reports.

The city will give anyone who buys a security camera a rebate of $250 to help with costs, though the city will not require citizens to hand over footage from the cameras.

Instead, people with cameras will be added to a list and police will know who to contact in the event of a crime in the area.

Some of the money will also go towards the mayor’s promise to outfit 2,800 of the city’s police officers with body cameras. Earlier this year the city council told Bowser it wouldn’t approve a proposal to put body cameras on police until she included funds to make the video footage available through Freedom of Information Act requests.

Originally, Bowser wanted to ban the public from accessing the body camera footage, but after push back from city council and activist groups, she agreed to concessions that would allow some video to become public.

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