Mayor Brandon Johnson’s budget director’s resignation is the latest shakeup of his administration’s finance team ahead of what is sure to be a grueling budget season.
Annette Guzman, director of the Office of Budget and Management, left her post to care for her sick mother, the mayor said during a Tuesday City Hall news conference. Her exit, reported by the Tribune Monday night, follows the resignations last week of acting Chief Financial Officer Steve Mahr and Deputy CFO Noor Shaikh in June — which came after CFO Jill Jaworski departed at the beginning of this year.
Johnson on Tuesday tried to tamp down concerns about what the turnover means for the city’s direction by arguing the most important constant is that he has stayed the course.
“They have stability. They have stability in me,” Johnson told reporters. “We do have continuity. I’m the continuity, right? Again, it’s not just one person in one particular position. I hire people, bring people in who can carry out my mission and vision. There will be others who can carry out that mission and vision.”
The mayor also condemned a question on how the revolving door under his administration affects relationships with aldermen as “reckless and irresponsible” given that Guzman had a family emergency. But her resignation does leave two of the three top city finance posts without a permanent leader, just weeks before Johnson introduces his fourth budget.
Nonetheless, Johnson said his team remains prepared to introduce a 2027 budget proposal in October and commended Guzman for steering his administration through “some of the most significant fiscal challenges that our city has faced.”
“Ten years of public service, at the City and at Cook County, has been the greatest honor of my career,” Guzman said in a statement released by the mayor’s office Monday evening. “During my tenure as City Budget Director, I am proud of the work we have accomplished to strengthen the City’s financial foundation and help ensure resources are aligned with the needs of working families and communities across Chicago.”
Guzman was one of the last remaining cabinet members who joined Johnson’s administration at the start of his term. She followed him from Cook County government, where she served as county Board President Toni Preckwinkle’s budget director.
During her tenure, Guzman oversaw three increasingly tense budgets, culminating in a full-blown rebellion from a group of aldermen during the most recent negotiations that led to the City Council passing a budget over the mayor’s objections for the first time in 40 years.
Johnson did not say Tuesday when he would appoint a permanent replacement for Guzman, but her deputy Jonathan Ernst, a highly respected veteran of the city’s budget office, will serve as acting budget director through the 2027 budget season.
City Hall is expected to again face a large deficit it needs to close by the end of this year. Negotiations will take place against the backdrop of looming city elections, with several mayoral candidates already in the race — but Johnson so far not saying whether he will seek another term. All 50 seats on the council are up in February as well.
The mayor on Tuesday heartily laughed off questions about Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias, who officially joined the race for Johnson’s seat on Sunday, and Willie Wilson, a perennial candidate who is teasing an announcement next week. He brushed off the ongoing scrutiny over his future as “my own little way of resistance” against the local political arena.
Meanwhile, outside of his finance team, Johnson’s cabinet also has two vacancies following last month’s exits of Sandra Blakemore, who headed the Department of Human Resources, and Julia Hernandez-Tomlin, who served as commissioner of the Department of Fleet and Facility Management.
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Neither were announced publicly at the time, but Johnson press secretary Allison Novelo confirmed Tuesday that Blakemore’s last day was July 15, with Katie Doyle taking over as acting DHR commissioner. Hernandez-Tomlin left on June 30, with Glen Cross serving as her interim replacement.
The council’s opposition bloc nodded to Blakemore’s departure on top of the finance team turnover in a Tuesday statement.
“The announcement of Budget Director Annette Guzman’s resignation is the latest in a string of senior officials leaving the Johnson administration,” the aldermanic coalition said in a statement released via Ald. Samantha Nugent’s office. “Given this continued wave of leadership team departures from City Hall, the mayor needs to provide the public with a full accounting of when and how his administration will deliver on a budget proposal.”
One issue for the next budget fight already: how much of a tax increment financing surplus Johnson will declare.
That question has been pushed to the forefront as the hybrid Chicago Public Schools board voted to approve a budget that assumed $150 million in additional revenue from Springfield.
CPS is already counting on the city to pull $285 million from the special property tax districts to help balance this school year’s budget.
Should state leaders not heed the mayor’s and the Chicago Teachers Union’s calls for the funding, the city will likely either need to cough up the additional money or risk painful midyear cuts at the district.
Johnson refused to say what his move would be in that event, though he acknowledged the political headwinds in Springfield, including the three-fifths threshold for passing new revenue items during the fall veto session.
“I’m just having a tough time with this idea that it’s harder to do something in Springfield than it is to do in City Council,” Johnson said. “I wonder if my value system is being taken advantage of because people know how much I care about public education. It’s like, ‘Man, Brandon will do it, so we don’t have to, Brandon will do it.'”
Guzman’s last day was Tuesday.
Throughout the most recent budget, she helped push back against Johnson’s emboldened foes, arguing that their projections were inaccurate and would worsen the city’s financial standing once revenue failed to come in at predicted levels.
That spending plan is now facing problems well into 2026. Guzman recently briefed aldermen that the city could face layoffs if a projected $90 million deficit materializes by year’s end. The city has so far been unable to commit to the second half of an advance pension payment because of property tax delays from Cook County. The aldermanic opposition has countered that Johnson’s administration is sabotaging the budget it passed against his will.
With Chicago already “under the microscope” by ratings agencies and potential buyers of the city’s debt, the exodus does not inspire confidence, said Richard Ciccarone, president emeritus of the municipal credit analysis firm Merritt Research Services.
“Markets like stability of all sorts, particularly in management, but I think this is a situation which is rather unsettled to begin with and therefore I think it’s going to concern a lot of people in the marketplace,” Ciccarone said. “Why are key people leaving all at once?”
The first key finance leader to leave Johnson’s administration was Chasse Rehwinkel, who resigned as the city’s comptroller in December 2024 to become Devon Bank’s chief financial officer. Michael Belsky replaced him as comptroller in July 2025 and remains in the post. The city’s debt manager, Brendan White, has taken over as acting CFO.
The annual investors conference, where city financial leaders take questions, highlight major projects and economic wins and preview upcoming borrowing plans, is scheduled for Aug. 13. Officials previously disclosed plans to borrow $700 million in the third quarter of this year.
“We’ve had dark clouds like this before,” said Ciccarone, who has followed Chicago’s finances since the 1970s. “But here’s what’s different about this one: The liabilities that we said are lurking down the road have come home to roost” while “the opportunities to go to the tax base are getting harder and harder and harder.”