Madison’s 2026 operating budget clocks in at 453 million dollars. But alders spent the vast majority of yesterday’s meeting debating how just 0.1 percent of the money should be spent – the Office of the Independent Monitor’s 405,000 dollar annual budget.
That’s after alders Knox, Pritchett, and Harrington-McKinney introduced a last-minute floor amendment that sought to transfer the OIM’s entire budget to the Madison Police Department, to pay for costs related to implementing body worn cameras.
They argued lack of reports, failing to produce records and other delays justified defunding the OIM. Alder Knox gave an account of his experiences, serving on the Police Civilian Oversight Board (PCOB) that the OIM reports to…