Richmond’s budget woes extend beyond the national recession and are being compounded by permanent revenue losses from Henrico County’s decision to change some ZIP code addresses from Richmond to Henrico, the city’s top finance official said. Marcus D. Jones, deputy chief administrative officer for finance and administration, told the City Council’s Finance Committee yesterday that the ZIP code change is partly responsible for a projected $10.3 million budget shortfall for the current fiscal year, but he said an amount hasn’t been determined.

Audits released this week for the cities of Austin, Texas, and Denver have stung two senior members of Richmond Mayor Dwight C. Jones’ administration. The Denver audit is particularly critical of work by Seedco Financial Services, which was led by Peter H. Chapman before he was hired this summer as Richmond’s deputy chief administrative officer for economic and community development.

An executive with the nonprofit Better Housing Coalition and a landscape architect are set to be appointed to the Richmond Planning Commission, despite concerns from a city councilman that it could end up with an anti-development bias. Lynn McAteer, vice president of planning and special projects for the housing coalition, and Doug Cole, a landscape architect and president of designforum, were recommended this week by the council’s Land Use, Housing and Transportation Standing Committee after interviews with four finalists.

Former Richmond Chief Administrative Officer Sheila Hill-Christian’s work for the city won’t end with her recent appointment to the GRTC Transit System board. She’s also partnering with a Texas-based consultant on an economic-development study for the city. TIP Strategies of Austin tapped Hill-Christian as a subcontractor to conduct interviews with local officials and business owners and to organize focus groups, she said.

The days of mostly empty GRTC Transit System buses barreling around Richmond could be numbered. Under a proposal scheduled for public hearings beginning tomorrow, the Richmond City Council will consider eliminating or severely reducing six routes and scaling back three others to help GRTC save about $1.2 million annually. Of the routes in question, the No. 68 Lunch Time Express has attracted the fewest riders—an average of 12 per day in fiscal 2008-09, compared with 641 for Westhampton. Overall, GRTC has about 40,000 riders per day on its 40 routes.

One of Mayor Dwight C. Jones’ top administrators is out of contention, but controversy still swirls over Richmond’s pending appointments to the GRTC Transit System board. The City Council is set to vote Monday to appoint former Chief Administrative Officer Sheila Hill-Christian, as well as current members Linda G. Broady-Meyers and James M. Johnson, to the GRTC board of directors. Chesterfield County, which jointly owns GRTC with the city, will tap the other three members.

Richmond Mayor Dwight C. Jones’ plan to reorganize several city departments won’t be legally binding without approval by the City Council, City Attorney Norman B. Sales said yesterday. At the request of several council members, Sales issued an opinion on the restructuring plan announced last week by the Jones administration. He said the city charter gives Chief Administrative Officer Byron C. Marshall the power to temporarily reassign employees under his control but reserves for the council the authority to alter or reorganize city departments.

A Richmond woman can keep street access to her carport on Stuart Avenue. The City Council voted 6-2 yesterday to strike a proposal to revoke the permit allowing Roberta Crowell to build a driveway across a city sidewalk in the Museum District. First District Councilman Bruce W. Tyler had proposed canceling the permit, citing safety concerns and the driveway’s proximity to St. Gertrude High School.

Richmond’s City Council could decide tomorrow whether a resident can keep her driveway on Stuart Avenue. Citing safety concerns, Councilman Bruce W. Tyler is seeking to revoke a permit allowing a curb cut to serve the concrete driveway at 3304 Stuart Ave., near St. Gertrude High School. Roberta Crowell got the permit last summer and built a carport.

The peace at Richmond City Hall has taken the urgency out of fixing flaws in the city charter that were at the root of legal clashes between then-Mayor L. Douglas Wilder and the City Council. While a commission is polishing its recommendations after months of review, council members are talking about not taking amendments to the General Assembly in 2010, as planned.

Some Richmond City Council members are thinking twice about sharing oversight of the city auditor in light of his revelation that the city violated purchasing rules on a nearly $1 million contract to buy police cars. The auditor currently serves at the pleasure of the council. But under draft recommendations of the Richmond City Charter Review Commission, he would be appointed by the mayor subject to the approval of the majority of council.

Byron C. Marshall, the lone finalist to be chief administrative officer of Richmond, is being brought back to town for another round of meetings with the City Council. Marshall, president and CEO of the nonprofit Austin Revitalization Authority in Texas, was expected to arrive last night for a series of private meetings this weekend, Tammy D. Hawley, press secretary to Mayor Dwight C. Jones, confirmed yesterday.

Byron C. Marshall, the lone finalist to be chief administrative officer of Richmond, is coming back to town. Marshall, president and chief executive officer of the nonprofit Austin Revitalization Authority in Texas, is scheduled to be here this weekend for additional private meetings with City Council members, Tammy D. Hawley, press secretary to Mayor Dwight C. Jones, confirmed today.

Richmond Mayor Dwight C. Jones is showing signs that he’ll soon fill several top positions in his administration. The city has pulled its recent advertisement for a deputy chief administrative officer for economic and community development, and an appointment is pending, according to Tammy D. Hawley, the mayor’s press secretary. The position offers a salary range of $111,957 to $168,732 per year.

The possible appointment of Byron C. Marshall as Richmond’s chief administrative officer is drawing sharply different responses from some City Council members. Early yesterday, council members said they believed a formal request to approve Marshall’s appointment could be introduced Monday by Mayor Dwight C. Jones. But the mayor’s office said such a request is not imminent.