San Diego City Council members are exploring fundamental changes to the city’s budget process that would give the council more power to debate and shape spending decisions, budget cuts and possible employee layoffs.
The proposals, which the council’s budget commitee endorsed last week, would shift some power over the city’s $5 billion annual budget from the mayor to the council.
“Some of the ideas here I really see as important ways of creating additional space for the council to own its power,” Council President Sean Elo-Rivera said. “I’m certainly intrigued by additional opportunites to modify what’s being proposed by the mayor.”
Instead of the mayor controlling the entire budget process until the council’s final vote in mid-June, the changes would allow the council to debate, propose and make adjustments along the way.
The council would also be able, for the first time, to propose cuts to free up money for council priorities. Under the existing system, the council can’t add items to the budget unless it finds additional revenue to pay for them.
The focus of two weeks of budget hearings the city holds each May would shift from department heads summarizing spending plans to council members suggesting and debating changes.
In addition, a new public hearing devoted to the council considering last-minute additions and cuts would be scheduled shortly before the final budget vote in mid-June.
The mayor, however, would retain the ability to veto the budget after adoption or to make targeted adjustments with a line-item veto. Votes from six of the council’s nine members are required to override a veto.
The mayor would also continue to be allowed to craft the initial spending plan that is the starting point for debate.
But the mayor might be required in future years to release that proposed budget before the existing deadline of April 15 to allow more time for debate than the existing two months.
The proposals come with San Diego facing a deficit in the fiscal year that begins July 1 of more than $100 million that city officials say could require significant budget cuts and layoffs this spring.
Councilmember Kent Lee, who blamed the projected deficit primarily on federal pandemic aid running out, said the need for cuts makes it even more important for the council to increase its role.
“It’s going to be even more critical that we have a process that strengthens our council’s ability to provide feedback, that allows us to identify what our collective priorities are, but ultimately to help produce a budget that not only is balanced but that actually meets and serves what we believe is needed in each of our individual communities,” said Lee, who is chairman of the Budget Committee.
The proposals were prompted by an analysis of how other large cities in California — Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland and Fresno — handle their budget process. The study was handled by the city’s independent budget analyst, who works for the council.
Some of the changes, such as re-shaping the budget review hearings in May and adding the special hearing before the final budget vote, could be quickly handled at Lee’s discretion.
Others, such as changing the date the mayor must release his proposed budget, would require a vote by San Diego residents to amend the city charter.
Lee said he plans to work with the IBA and the mayor’s financial staff to make many of the changes happen quickly.
Rolando Charvel, the city’s comptroller and director of finance, said the mayor’s staff supports the proposals.
Another possible change would be shrinking the number of requests in budget priority memos council members send the mayor each fall and winter to try to shape the budget.
IBA analyst Sergio Alcalde said Oakland, the only other large California city that uses budget priority memos, limits the number of requests to seven to make them more important.
“If everything becomes a priority, then nothing is,” Alcalde said.
Council members said they were most upbeat about the new special hearing just before the final budget vote.
“It’s very difficult with the existing public hearing schedule to make final modifications on the day that the council passes the budget because we often don’t have sufficient information what the impact of an additional expenditure will be,” Councilmember Vivian Moreno said.
Elo-Rivera said the changes aren’t about animosity between Mayor Todd Gloria, who is a Democrat, and the council, which is made up entirely of Democrats.
“It doesn’t mean it’s in conflict with the administration or the department of finance, it’s just about us owning our power,” he said. “It doesn’t have to be an adversarial position.”
