With the Trump administration now cutting U.S. government programs and personnel by the day, San Diego County supervisors directed officials to develop a strategy to warn people if and when their federally funded services are threatened.
The Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to figure out a way to notify up to hundreds of thousands of people that their specific programs may be curtailed under the ongoing cuts being implemented in Washington.
The action gave Chief Administrative Officer Ebony Shelton up to 30 days to develop a broad notification strategy that would include direct mail, email and flyers at various county facilities aimed at warning clients that services may be cut.
“Hundreds of thousands of San Diego families rely on federally funded programs to meet basic needs, including healthcare, housing assistance, food security and workforce development,” Supervisor Terra Lawson-Remer wrote to her board colleagues.
She cited a U.S. House of Representatives budget proposal that called for 15 percent cuts in housing assistance, a move the supervisor said could adversely affect 10,000 or more residents, along with a 20 percent cut to federal food-assistance efforts that could deny benefits to some 400,000 people.
“The recent federal budget proposals proposed by the administration and congressional leaders put these lifelines at serious risk,” Lawson-Remer said. “Cuts of this magnitude will have real and devastating consequences for residents across San Diego County.”
It was not immediately clear how much the strategy might cost to implement.
Lawson-Remer said she did not expect the program would require any additional staff, but “there may be additional fiscal impacts in the future depending on the notification strategies that are developed.”
Since Trump was sworn in for his second four-year term on Jan. 20, his administration has fired or terminated tens of thousands of federal workers, including in San Diego County.
Trump also put billionaire Elon Musk in charge of an agency tasked with slashing a slew of federal agencies and programs.
The so-called Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, already has cut billions of dollars worth of service both domestically and across the globe. Many of the firings and department cuts have been challenged in court.
