Butler City Councilman Michael Walter reported at Tuesday’s meeting that the city’s financial outlook is still bleak, but has improved.

Walter said that the city may be $54,000 in the hole by November, as opposed to $300,000 he had previously been told when the city received an auditing report in June by Maher Duessel.

“The past couple weeks, I actually feel good about our budget for the rest of the year,” Walter said.

He attributed the decrease to cuts made across each municipal department.

“As we’re approaching the end of the year, I don’t think we’re going to need to borrow any money,” he said. “If we can postpone a couple things until next year, then we’re in good shape.”

In an attempt to save money, a motion will be made at Thursday’s city council meeting to direct city clerk Mindy Gall and the heads of all city departments “to discontinue all discretionary purchases and expenditures with the goal of conserving all available funds” from the time it is passed until March 31.

Fuel costs are exempt, and any costs that are more than $50 will need to be signed off by Walter and the department head, unless it is an administrative purchase. In that case, it will need to be signed off by Walter and either Councilman Kenny Bonus or Councilman Corey Roche.