WOONSOCKET — City Hall was oddly quiet after Mayor Susan D. Menard announced last Friday that she would be leaving office in June, but it was clear city officials were pressing ahead with the issues that confront the city.

Neither council members nor the Personnel Department had received official notice that Menard is leaving. City Councilman Roger Jalette said that a few constituents called him to ask if there was a chance Menard would change her mind. “She said, ‘absolutely not,’ ” he reported.

Under the City Charter, the council president will take over as mayor, serving out the remaining 18 months of Menard’s term. A special election will be held to fill the council seat left open.

Leo Fontaine, the president of the City Council, will take over as mayor. Fontaine said he spoke with Menard Saturday and that they talked about working together on the city’s beleaguered budget.

For the current fiscal year, the city faces a proposed loss of $700,000 from the governor, who is trying to balance a multimillion-dollar state deficit by cutting money to cities and towns. Fontaine said that for fiscal year 2007, the city has a $500,000 deficit because the city budgeted revenue it is scheduled to get from the sale of property to Walmart, but the sale has not taken place.

The pension fund is underfunded and the pension board went out to bid for a new investment administrator, Fontaine said. The problem with that, Fontaine said, is that if at the end of the fiscal year the pension fund remains underfunded, the amount will have to be made up from contributions from the municipal budget.

The council planned to meet tonight to vote on a resolution that invokes the council’s authority under the City Charter to investigate city affairs. Menard was successful in blocking the council’s attempt to have its first investigative meeting last Thursday to question two city employees who had been subpoenaed by the council because the resolution was too vague. The Superior Court granted a temporary injunction. The council will vote on the new resolution in hopes that the judge will lift the injunction during a court hearing tomorrow. The council said it is investigating whether city employees were told to do work they were not supposed to be doing. They have declined to give any more details.

Menard has declined to talk with The Journal about her reasons for leaving and whether it was precipitated by last week’s departure of the former police chief and deputy chief. Chief Michael L.A. Houle and the former deputy chief, Richard Dubois, retired after Houle’s ex-wife, Marsha Bish, made allegations that he and Dubois changed test scores on police exams. Both men denied the charges. The Rhode Island State Police is running the Police Department until the city hires a new police chief.

tpina@projo.com