Bill Green's Frequently Asked Questions

It is 11:32 a.m., and Councilman Bill Green is asking a question.

This is not at all unusual. If City Council is in session, the odds are outstanding that Green is asking a question.

By pretty much any yardstick - questions asked, attendance, time at the microphone - Green has been the dominant presence in the budget hearings of the last month and a half.

He asks big questions, small questions, and questions about virtually every department in the city.

All council members have their pet interests, issues that pique their curiosity. Councilman Jack Kelly for instance, is typically silent or absent from budget hearings, until the issue of animal welfare comes up, and then he is full of questions and opinions.

What sets Green apart is his remarkably broad range of interests. He has not missed more than perhaps two or three out of 50 hearings. At every single one he's attended, he's asked question, usually dozens, oftentimes more than all other attending council members combined.

His office keeps a tally of questions asked at budget hearings that Nutter administration witnesses are unable to answer right away. Green's staff does that to track the administration's response rate, but the list also gives a good sense of just how much Green dominates these hearings: of the 476 such questions asked, Green has posed 293 of them.

The next closest total? The 32 queries posed by Councilman Curtis Jones Jr.

Part of this, Green says, is because he's been asked by council leadership to find potential savings in the budget. But we suspect a bigger part of it is that Green really, really likes this part of his job.

For more on council's questions, check out today's print edition of Heard in the Hall.

Take a look at Green's tally of questions yourself below...

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