FAIRHOPE, Ala. - The City Council-appointed budget committee will meet tomorrow to complete its work prior to the expected adoption by the council Monday of the fiscal 2011 budget.

“Thursday’s budget committee meeting is the final act of the city’s managers’ to propose and present a rational income and expense plan to the elected representatives for approval,” said Stan Grubin, budget committee chair. “This plan, when approved by the council, will in large measure dictate how Fairhope citizens will be served in 2011.”

The current fiscal year ends Sept. 30, and an audit of the city’s financial reporting for fiscal 2010 will be presented to the council in early 2011.

What is most important about the current budget process is that budgets are now prepared by department heads and approved by a four-person team of senior city staff, Grubin said. That team consists of the city administrator, general superintendent, city treasurer and financial reporting manager.

That process differed from years prior to last summer, when the city’s budget was prepared primarily by the mayor’s office with little input from department heads or council, according to city officials and staff.

According to the “Handbook for Mayors and Councilmembers,” published by the Alabama League of Municipalities, a city’s mayor ordinarily serves as budget officer and prepares a tentative budget after consultation with department heads, who submit estimates by a deadline date, at which time their estimates and recommendations are discussed.

“Usually the mayor, at the council’s request, submits recommendations which amount to a tentative budget for the coming fiscal year,” the ALM handbook states. “Customarily, the mayor , as budget officer, and the council meet in conference to discuss item by item, provisions of the tentative budget. After the conference, the council, must determine the final form of the budget.”

Last year, the council appointed a committee to hold two days of hearings with department heads to discuss their recommended budgets. The mayor played a more active role last summer than he did during this year’s budget meetings and hearings with department heads and committee members.

“The managers now own their budgets,” Grubin said. “As a business executive, management consultant and former mayor of a township in New Jersey who has spent a lifetime doing budgeting, I strongly assure you that the greatest value of a budget is its preparation. It is my firm belief that Fairhope is now building a stronger foundation to better manage its future.”

The city’s budget committee meets at 1 p.m., Thursday, Sept. 23 in the Delchamps Room at the Fairhope Civic Center.