A half hour into Jackson’s final budget meeting Wednesday, Councilmember Vernon Hartley wanted to know if — out of the hundreds of millions of dollars the city council was poised to pass in the annual budget — the city could allocate $2.5 million to blight control equipment.

Pieter Teeuwissen, the chief administrative officer, leaned down from the dais to speak with one of his employees before offering a counter: That would work if Hartley dropped the number by a million.

“No sir,” Hartley said.

Then Teeuwissen explained his hesitation: Like many officials in the council chambers, he lacked confidence in the accuracy of the city’s proposed budget book.

“All this is numbers that none of us are willing to build our own financial houses on,” he said. “So I don’t want you allocating money

See Full Page