Politics

San Diego City Council Tackles The Structural Deficit

By Alison St John / Reporter

Published February 22, 2010 at 2:02 PM PST

This story was published more than 14 years ago.

San Diego city council today agreed to a dozen guiding principals designed to eventually eliminate the city's ongoing structural deficit. The structural deficit is created because the city's revenues do not match its spending.

The council agreed to principals suggested by the Independent Budget Analyst. They include looking for new revenues as well as cutting spending, charging fees that cover the cost of services, and reducing pension and health care costs.

They agreed to maintain a reserve fund of no less than 7 percent of the General Fund, and only approve new facilities or programs if they aren't funded through the General Fund. Council President Ben Hueso modified this to allow new programs if they are necessary to meet high priority needs.

Become a KPBS sponsor

April Boling, a CPA who has run for council and headed the Taxpayers Association, urged the council to put a real number on the gap between revenues and expenditure.

"You need to be able to say to the citizens of San Diego, 'Well yes, we did balance this budget, but please note that in the process, the deferred maintenance is going up.'" Boling told the council. "It was balanced on the back of the silent deficit, which is really what is happening."

Boling pointed out that while the city is now funding its pension fund, it is not fully funding future retiree health care obligations or paying for regular maintenance on buildings and roads.

The council modified the language of the principals that commit to begin to fully fund retiree health care and deferred maintenance, adding the words, "develop a plan" to begin to fully fund those obligations.

The council agreed to get a dollar estimate of the deferred maintenance backlog.

Tags

Politics San Diego Government

Alison St John

twitter

Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.