Two years ago, facing a $9 million budget shortfall, Fullerton leaders were tasked with combing through the city’s expenses to decide where best to make tough cuts to balance the budget while navigating the pandemic.
Senior staffers took 10% pay cuts, part-time employees were laid off and library hours were pared down, among other cost saving measures. And this year, another 2.5% was cut from the general fund to balance the budget.
Now city officials appear more optimistic about Fullerton’s financial picture. Revenue from sales, property and hotel taxes has rebounded from the pandemic with more vigor than expected, and COVID-19-related government aid will help balance out expenses and fund work on much-needed infrastructure projects.
The city’s annual estimated revenue growth for the next fiscal year is “really back to where it was kind of pre-pandemic,” said Ellis Chang, Fullerton’s director of administrative services. “I think we are kind of stabilizing and kind of getting our feet under us again after the pandemic.”
A recent first public look at the 2022-23 fiscal year budget offered a positive outlook, showing Fullerton maintaining a healthy pot of reserves after estimated revenues and expenses were calculated out. Jeff Collier, Fullerton’s interim city manager, said officials are starting to talk about building back up some departments that atrophied during the pandemic – such as parks and recreation – and noted new development projects are being approved in the city, both of which are “positive signs for Fullerton moving forward.”
But to steady the ship, city leaders have had to chip away at an already lean budget that has troubled Fullerton for years. In this fiscal year, the City Council’s approved cuts will leave vacant a number of unfilled positions across city departments, from police to public works. That’s on top of a $3.8 million reduction already approved last fiscal year. Together the cuts mean more than 50 positions city-wide remain unfilled.
Those savings will continue into the next fiscal year that begins in July, staffer said. Paring back on community events, such as the city’s Fourth of July event, the downtown market and First Night Fullerton, were also among the 2.5% cuts.
Ten of the unfilled city jobs are officer positions in the Fullerton Police Department. In public works, nine roles will remain open. In the Fire Department, five administrative jobs will stay vacant.
Police Chief Bob Dunn said his agency has combined some specialty units in response to the hiring cap, and right now has no motor team dedicated to daily traffic enforcement. Before the recent vacancies, the department was budgeted for 140 sworn officers – though officials note the department was dealing with sworn staff leaving prior to the pandemic.
Now the cap is 130, and 118 officers currently work at the agency.
Dunn said he’s not worried that his agency won’t be able to provide public safety services to that level that residents need them, “but certainly, some of the additional services that police departments provide, that’s the area where we’ve had to make some cuts.”
While the agency works on recruiting to its limit, Dunn said having a fixed cap has at least offered some stability.
“When you’re constantly trying to figure out where you’re going to end up, what the number is going to be, where it’s going to be, how much that equates to and savings and all that stuff, I think that rubs more on the morale of the department,” he said. “Once you have certainty, I think it creates a little bit more stability and stability is important for moving forward.”
While the city’s Fire Department will continue to keep a handful of administrative positions open, four firefighter roles that were intended to remain unfilled are back on the table now that a shared command staff arrangement with the city of Brea is ending.
Mayor Fred Jung said he sees the budget reductions as not only a necessary move to balance the budget, but as “an opportunity to reimagine government for a moment, to modernize ourselves, to become more efficient, to think out of the box,” he said.
“I don’t believe that this is the negative,” Jung said. “I just find that implying that there’s this rather flawed choice between future consequences by ignoring a deficit and service to our community is detrimental to our residents as a whole, because there really isn’t a choice. The future consequences by ignoring a deficit are very real.”
For the 2022-23 budget proposal, Fullerton staffers are filling a nearly $700,000 gap between spending expectations and revenue estimates with pandemic relief funds. Chang said that’s what a portion of those federal funds were intended for, “to help stabilize government operations.”
Jung asked the city’s staff to research a ballot measure that could increase the city’s transient occupancy tax, or TOT, which is charged on hotel rooms and short term rentals stays to potentially offset the deficit.
