Frey vetoes Minneapolis budget a day after it was approved by City Council

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey on Wednesday vetoed the $1.9 billion budget passed by the City Council on Tuesday night, although he signed off on the property tax levy set by the council, which is 6.8% higher than the 2024 levy.

It’s believed to be the first time a Minneapolis mayor has vetoed a city budget, according to City Clerk Casey Carl. The council approved the budget by a 10-3 vote, enough to override the veto, if that margin holds. Nine votes are needed to override. The council could vote on that question as soon as Thursday morning.

“Do I have the votes in order to sustain a veto override? I don’t know, but we’re doing the right thing,” Frey said during a news conference.

The council approved the levy — which was smaller than the 8.1% increase Frey proposed in August — after three days of marathon budget meetings where members considered a record 78 amendments.

Minutes after the more progressive wing of the council ended a Wednesday news conference at City Hall trumpeting their budget, Frey said he would veto it, calling it reckless and irresponsible. He said it adds $6.53 million in new spending, much of it taken from the city’s cash reserves and additional transfers from the Downtown Assets Fund. He said the money was used to fund new, unvetted pet projects that council members directed to certain wards.

Frey said he represents the whole city and needs to do what’s best for it rather than “one special interest group.”

“We’ve got to love our city more than our ideology,” Frey said.

City Council President Elliott Payne, who voted in favor of the budget, released a statement calling it “absurd” that Frey was willing to veto the entire 2025 city budget because the council, a co-equal branch of government, made amendments equal to less than 2% of the total. He said Frey announced his plan to veto the budget even before he received the formal budget packet from the clerk’s office.

Payne called it part of a larger pattern of being unwilling to work with the legislative branch and accused Frey of trying to score political points by being willing to risk the jobs of more than 4,000 city employees. That’s if the council sustains the veto, after which the council and Frey would have to work on a compromise budget. If a compromise isn’t reached by Jan. 1, a temporary budget could be passed for a couple of weeks or a month, Frey said.

However, that seems unlikely, given that 62 amendments passed with a supermajority, and the final budget passed 10-3.

“I will do everything in my power to work with my colleagues to overturn this reckless veto,” Payne said.

Late Tuesday night, the council approved amendments directing funding to specific nonprofits and projects, including the Latino Center for Community Engagement, Mercado Central economic development project, One Southside clinic project and Mni Sota Fund Indigenous Wealth Building Center.

Frey was also critical of the council’s decision to steer money toward public safety initiatives in the neighborhoods of Hiawatha, Whittier, Longfellow and Midtown Phillips, saying the city should stick to a comprehensive public safety system.

Frey said the council cut or earmarked $15.9 million from city departments for new or altered programs, cut $1.8 million from Minneapolis Police Department programs, and directed $6 million for unvetted, short-term projects or outside organizations, many hand-picked by the council rather than subjected to a competitive process.

Frey said the council passed the largest number of budget amendments in recent history — nearly double last year’s total — which he described as “an alarming trend of prioritizing new, unvetted initiatives over the core functions that keep Minneapolis running smoothly, make our city safer, and maintain equity for all residents.” That will make it more difficult for city workers to perform core services, like plow snow, fill potholes and fix streetlights, he said, while council members added more work to “chase the whims of their unvetted ideas.”

Chief Operations Officer Margaret Anderson Kelliher said Wednesday was a difficult day for city staff members, who need predictability and stability, not a budget that’s “a product of a very chaotic, haphazard amendment process.”

“By changing dollar amounts around, making earmarks to specific parts of the city, it is going to mean delayed maintenance to residents for being able to do things like both repair basic lighting and the wave of copper theft that we see we will not get done,” she said.

Frey said the council’s cut to his proposed Police Department budget would reduce spending “for things like cell phones,” the chaplain program and a police recruitment campaign.

Some of that money, about $631,000, was taken from the chief’s budget to fund five civilian investigators, who handle nonviolent cases to free up police officers for more serious work. Another $500,000 was cut from a recruitment campaign.

Police Chief Brian O’Hara said the change hurts a department that continues to struggle with short-staffing after losing more than 500 sworn officers since 2020.

“We don’t have anything else to cut,” he said. “Why on Earth would we want to stop recruiting them?”

The council cut 22% of the Racial Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Department’s staff, which was formed following the 2020 police killing of George Floyd.

Frey said the cut “devastates” the office and its ability to do its work.

But some of the cuts and transfers were motivated by the office’s performance regarding the annual Trans Equity Summit.

Council Vice President Aisha Chughtai, who chairs the Budget Committee, wrote an amendment moving two vacant positions and funding for contractual services out of the office and into the Neighborhood and Community Relations Department, saying the office was no longer deeply connected to the LGBTQ community. In October, 10 LGBTQ advocacy groups expressed concerns about the lack of trans people’s involvement in planning the annual summit, a free event the city has hosted for trans and gender nonconforming people since 2014. Leaders of the group said they were concerned that “trans partners and voices have been sidelined as the project has evolved.”

Wednesday evening, the St. Paul City Council bucked Mayor Melvin Carter by rejected his budget proposal and approving a budget with a lower tax increase.