Fresno City Council file photo

published on June 23, 2017 - 11:42 AM

Written by David Castellon

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The Fresno City Council has approved a $1.13 billion budget for fiscal 2018 that is slated to put 21 new police officers on city streets and give each of the seven City Council members $100,000 to put toward city park improvements.

The new budget exceeds the fiscal 2017 budget that the council passed about a year ago by more than $39 million. That budget later was amended, and Fresno’s total appropriations for the 2017 fiscal year, ending June 30, is slated to total more than $1.25 billion, exceeding the new budget approved during Monday’s City Council meeting.

“It’s never easy. This is my first budget as a chief executive. I went through eight budgets as a city councilman, and it’s a totally different perspective,” Mayor Lee Brand said after the budget vote.

“But we’re not like we were, back when I started in 2009 — laying people off, cutting back services” due to the recession, he said, noting that this is a balanced budget.

Specifically, Fresno’s total revenues for the coming fiscal year are expected to total about $1.19 billion, more than what the city plans to spend in the new budget year.

Under that forecast, city officials estimate that Fresno property tax payments – the city’s largest source of tax revenues — will rise about 8.7 percent in the coming year, while sales tax will decline more than 9 percent.

The bulk of the city’s costs will be tied to employee salaries and benefits, but Brand noted that because the city’s retirement fund is in such good shape – as it’s funded at 15 percent above its expected costs – the county isn’t incurring the additional costs many cities and counties are having to shoulder to keep their plans funded.

As such, Fresno’s total anticipated contribution to its retirement fund in fiscal 2018 is expected to be $3.95 million, down 6.3 percent from last year.

Brand said one of his focuses for the coming year is economic development, specifically his plans to promote Fresno as an e-commerce center on the heels of Ulta Beauty and Amazon.com announcing plans to build major distribution centers for online orders here.

To build on that success, the new budget earmarks an extra $44,000 for economic development, which will help pay for marketing costs to promote the city as an e-commerce hub and an economic study of new fulfillment centers here.

Brand noted that public safety is a priority in the new budget, with the number of sworn police officers slated to increase from 804 to 825 in the coming fiscal year.

He said each of the 21 new officers will add about $100,000 to the year’s budget, but nearly half the cost of the added staff will come from Fresno Area Express (FAX) budget, as nine of the officers will be assigned to the police FAX Unit, providing public safety services to the bus system.

Councilman Luis Chavez said he was particularly pleased that the budget includes more than $5.8 million to fund construction a new police station in southeast Fresno, within his district.

The new station will be 10,280 square feet larger than the city’s current southeast station.

Chavez also noted that the budget includes $550,000 for developing a community-specific plan for his district to look how to plan future development there and $250,000 to build a splash park next to the pool near the Sal Mosqueda Community Center.

An amendment to the mayor’s initial budget proposal is to divide $700,000 in collected park impact fees between the seven councilmen, with each having authority to spend it on park projects of their choices.

“I’d like to do some improvements to the soccer fields I have in [my] district,” Chavez said of what he plans to do with the money.