New Orleans Chief Administrative Officer Joe Giarrusso says he understands why some people aren’t happy with the belt-tightening Mayor Helena Moreno is proposing for 2027, including cuts to the city’s low-barrier homeless shelter and police.
But he argues Moreno’s 2027 budget proposal reflects not only the obvious shortfalls between revenue and spending, but an effort to account for expenses previous administrations hid through accounting tricks and omissions.
“I still don’t know how much (then-CAO) Gilbert (Montano) knew versus (the Department of) Finance versus the mayor (LaToya Cantrell), but that’s what we’re trying to do right now,” Giarrusso told Gambit Editor John Stanton during an interview on The Get Down…