Written by Brandon Romo
San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria made revisions to the city’s May budget plan that included salary increases for the majority of city employees and opening San Diego libraries seven days a week. The intention of increasing city employee pay is to make them more competitive amongst other local agencies.
These changes include an increase of about $73 million in city spending. With the added revisions to the budget proposal, the city’s total spending for the Fiscal Year of 2022 will reach $4.6 billion which starts July 1, 2021, and goes through June 30, 2022. The original budget proposal had spending at about $4.5 billion but was denied by the City Council and public for a proposal to limit city library hours to five days a week with aims to reduce spending.
Gloria’s prior April proposal still stands in the new plan, spending more than $14 million on getting families and businesses in San Diego back to working full-time.
The rest of the budget will go towards:
- Building $10 million “sexy” streets in historically underserved communities, with $30 being added through debt
- Funding for the new Homelessness Strategies Department
- Updating the Climate Action Plan
- $5 million investment with the new Climate Equity Fund
- Creating the “Summer for All of Us” program for children at recreation centers
- “No Shots Fired” gang prevention program
- An overtime decrease to the San Diego Police Department of about $4 billion annually
“This budget update takes a balanced approach to stabilize the city’s finances while investing in the people who provide services that make San Diego better for all of us,” Gloria stated.
Following several weeks of public and City Council revision, the final budget will be adopted in June.
