Long story short
City Manager Erik Walsh said the city’s proposed total budget is $4.04 billion and includes a general fund of $1.69 billion, and represents a 2.2% budget increase.
Walsh said that though city staff looked to balance any deficits, the proposed budget was designed to prioritize core services.
"Our guiding principles that we shared...were that we were going to protect essential, mandated services, our core services, we're going to minimize the impact to vulnerable populations, and we're going to avoid a long term risk at the expense of chasing the budget," Walsh said.
Key investments within budget include:
- $423,000 for low barrier homeless shelter construction
- $17 million for sidewalks
- $2 million for street lights
- $122.4 million for street maintenance/repair
- $30.4 million for affordable housing
Walsh also addressed projected deficits of $21 million for FY 2025-26 and $52 million for FY 2026-27, totaling approximately $73 million. The deficit is partly due to the city’s revenue growing slower than expenses and to property tax values decreasing by 1%, which is the first time the base values have decreased since the 2008-09 recession. Walsh said the city’s proposed budget takes on a multipronged approach to balancing the budget.
Multipronged approach includes:
- Reducing spending by $11 million, with minimal impact to essential services
- Adjusting revenue to bring in $12 million from fee and fine increases
- Capturing $9 million from CPS utility sales offsets
- Moving eligible projects from the operating to capital budget
- Comprehensive departmental budget reviews
- Used savings from completed projects and unspent balances
Walsh said the budget includes funds for 13,723 city positions, including 2,893 police officers and 1,815 firefighters. 68 civilian positions will be eliminated in the budget, with 35 affected employees relocated to other positions within the city.
“[The budget includes] a net increase of 116 positions,” Walsh said.
Employee compensation includes:
- 2% raise for civilian employees
- 8% raise for firefighters
- 4% raise for police officers
- 5% healthcare premium increase, which is the first since 2018
Walsh said the city will maintain the property tax rate of $54.159 per $100 valuation. This will be the 33rd consecutive year that the city has not raised the tax rate.
Looking ahead
The City Council will hold a series of town halls in August and will vote on adopting the budget Sept. 18.
