As the newly appointed budget director for a large municipality, you are now required to recommend a budget policy for when city department managers in the executive branch can reassign budgeted resources without approval of the legislative branch, the governing authority over appropriations. The policy must be reviewed and approved by the city mayor and submitted to the city council for passage into law, either as proposed or with modification. If enacted by the city council, it would establish a "legal level of control" over government spending. For example, department managers may be authorized to reassign resources among objects-of-expenditures within an appropriation but not among activities.

As you think through your proposed policy, what primary objective would you seek to attain and what tradeoffs would you consider in your analysis?