I’m curious to know how Jay Goldstone, the Chief Operating Officer of the City of San Diego, can state that the city has had “four years of significant budget reductions.”
This quote is taken from a memo that went around to city department heads on Monday. Full memo can be found here (quote is in first paragraph).
Below are financial figures for the city by departments over the course of 2003 to 2009. A few occasional departments show a sporadic reductions, but one doesn’t have to be financial wizard to recognize that they general trend is clearly increased spending year over year. Such inaccurate language from someone so high up in the private sector would end their career.
$ amounts are in thousands.
SOURCE: City of San Diego, Consolidated Annual Financial Reports FY2003 – FY2009
General Government and Support
2001-02 $181,722
2002-03 $204,072
2003-04 $221,752
2004-05 $247,038
2005-06 $252,295
2006-07 $270,190
2007-08 $322,157
2008-09 $303,581
Public Safety – Police
2001-02 $298,176
2002-03 $334,461
2003-04 $361,501
2004-05 $372,230
2005-06 $370,990
2006-07 $376,581
2007-08 $382,907
2008-09 $418,549
Public Safety – Fire and Rescue
2001-02 $139,699
2002-03 $147,897
2003-04 $173,311
2004-05 $186,203
2005-06 $194,074
2006-07 $209,902
2007-08 $204,822
2008-09 $220,787
Parks and Recreation
2001-02 $181,762
2002-03 $202,567
2003-04 $204,736
2004-05 $218,601
2005-06 $237,375
2006-07 $229,500
2007-08 $231,955
2008-09 $258,038
Transportation
2001-02 $153,002
2002-03 $154,603
2003-04 $197,152
2004-05 $220,095
2005-06 $200,883
2006-07 $272,780
2007-08 $212,255
2008-09 $239,305
Sanitation and Health
2001-02 $57,227
2002-03 $37,615
2003-04 $44,925
2004-05 $45,088
2005-06 $48,774
2006-07 $43,780
2007-08 $51,772
2008-09 $77,447
Neighborhood Services
2001-02 $116,397
2002-03 $95,267
2003-04 $100,568
2004-05 $89,162
2005-06 $111,886
2006-07 $99,870
2007-08 $91,110
2008-09 $116,735
Interest on Long Term Debt
2001-02 $59,952
2002-03 $68,410
2003-04 $71,588
2004-05 $73,381
2005-06 $71,109
2006-07 $84,920
2007-08 $82,211
2008-09 $84,070
Comments 2
Steve, perhaps Mr. Goldstone is referring to “discretionary” budgets when he refers to “significant budget reductions.” It’s absolutely true that the City is cutting budgets for the services we taxpayers receive. All the budget GROWTH is in the bloated pensions and benefits public labor union employees and retirees receive. We’re getting a lot less for a lot more spending. What’s wrong with this picture?
I received a similar comment on my Twitter account, which I believe indicates that pension costs are indeed spread out between the departments. That does make a little more sense, although I still would like to see something that would be regarded as “significant cuts.” I’d also like to see a point where these department heads asked to have a little less funding but contract out some of their services (a la “Competition Works”)
This article does a good job of explaining the deceptive higher budget for less services:
http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/this_just_in/article_0f0085aa-df9c-11de-85c1-001cc4c002e0.html
The bottomline, paying more, for getting less shouldn’t be acceptable in any budget and illustrates some major management (at the elected level) that needs addressing.
Thanks for the comment.