A father and child embrace outdoors with a winter mountain backdrop.

The State of the City

What’s the state of our city? Flagstaff city staff and council are moving into a series of retreats where we’ll discuss how the city fared through the FY25 budget, where revenues and expenses stand as of the end of 2025, and look forward to our FY27 budget. In addition to discussing and developing next year’s budget, we’ll also discuss progress made on several capital projects.

Many mayors give a State of the City address—an update on the budget, projects, new initiatives, etc. I’m happy to announce that I’ll be presenting my address on Friday, January 16, 2026, with breakfast beginning at 7:30 a.m. at Little America. Tickets are available through the Greater Flagstaff Chamber of Commerce. I’m grateful to the Chamber for allowing me this opportunity and I hope to see you there!

City staff are lending their talents to the address—filming a short video to kick it off and assisting me with the presentation design. I’m getting the city council involved, discussing what they look forward to in 2026. It’s important to me that this be a group endeavor and reflect the breadth of effort and skill running the city entails.

So what will I be talking about? I’ll talk about the state of housing affordability, a glimpse at our 2026 economic outlook, job creation efforts, water security, forest health, and sustainability measures. I’ll provide updates on the city’s code analysis project, capital projects, and legislative priorities.

I’ll talk about the city’s challenges, changes, and opportunities. I’ll introduce the audience to city council members and city staff—putting faces to names and helping to provide connections.

The recording and presentations from the December 19 city council budget retreat are available on the city’s YouTube channel and website. Our upcoming budget retreats are scheduled for February 5 and April 23 and 24. The city council is tentatively scheduled to adopt the FY27 budget on June 2. It’s important that the budget be accessible to residents and as easy to understand as possible—just as it’s important that the city continue to work on communicating using methods that work for you. Here’s to a prosperous and peaceful 2026!

This column appears in the January 2026 edition of the Flagstaff Business News.

State of the City

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