Vallejo City Council settles budget adjustments with eye on public safety, homelessness

VALLEJO - The Vallejo City Council approved a budget plan for the rest of the fiscal year on Tuesday with new spending for homelessness and improving public safety as pressure to address crime grows.

The City Council voted 6-1, with Vice Mayor Peter Bregenzer opposed, to finalize approval of a mid-year adjusted budget while eyeing a projected $6.6 million spending gap. They added up to $175,000 for a forthcoming plan to handle homelessness and $125,000 for small business security improvement grants.

Mayor Andrea Sorce emphasized the need to spend carefully with an eye on the spending gap, even though it’s covered using a surplus from last year’s budget for now.

Like many cities in California, Vallejo faces a combination of growing costs with shrinking sales and property tax revenue, in part due to declining consumer spending combined with rising inflation. The council voted for the first time on Feb. 11 to approve more than $4 million in adjustments, such as adding $519,721 for Solano County Sheriff's Office and Humane Society of the North Bay for animal shelter and care services and three new firefighter positions. 

While voting a second time Tuesday to set those changes in motion, the council focused on new approaches to current problems – particularly $125,000 for grants to improve security at local small businesses. This comes at a time when Vallejo officials have been pressured to address both petty and violent crime. 

City Manager Andrew Murray said he routinely speaks to business owners in Vallejo about problems like illegal dumping and abandoned vehicles near their businesses, which they say impact their sales. Councilmember Tonia Lediju said she’s spoken to a business owner who’s reportedly considering leaving Vallejo after decades due to expensive break-ins. 

The city has already administered “hardening grants” for businesses which apply for aid, using American Rescue Plan Act funds during the COVID-19 pandemic. More than 30 businesses applied for assistance, city officials said. 

As for the $175,000 “unhoused strategic plan,” Murray said the city is putting together a selection panel this month to meet and recommend a vendor who will handle drafting the plan, after which the city council can approve the project scope and contractor. The goal is to have a specific plan in place to address the factors of homelessness in Vallejo, Murray said.

The council also addressed $50,000 allocated last month to hire a violence prevention consultant in the Vallejo Police Department, who can analyze gun violence reduction methods in the city and report to the council about how much has been lost on resources responding to that violence. Sorce said she had concerns about spending so much on violence prevention right away, when many cuts must be made to the coming 2025-26 budget. She said there hasn’t been a cost analysis of how much has been lost due to responses to violent crime.

But other councilmembers said they support spending the money, with Councilmember Helen-Marie Gordon saying she wants to show the council is “willing to put the work in.” Councilmember Lediju said the decision also shows a desire to look at risks and effects on people affected by gun violence, although she said the city could get better at identifying and acting on the more urgent community needs. 

Councilmember Alexander Matias said he thinks it's important to be willing to spend money on long term investments like public safety, despite the need for fiscal caution.

“Across the board, we’re running deficits,” Matias said. “You know, Solano County has a deficit of around $13 million. The natural tendency, when you see that number, is to cut back. Yes, let’s look for opportunities to cut back spending where it does make sense. All I saw last year was ‘spend spend spend’ just to keep the lights on. I do think we need to be proactive … Every city’s experiencing the same issue. Otherwise, a few years from now we’ll be having the same conversation.”

Sorce said she agreed about making investments in the city’s future while also making prudent cuts that will pay off.

“I think we need to be relentless with cuts, and also do more with less. For too long, the city has thrown money at problems, or not used data to [make] decisions,” Sorce said. 

Several residents spoke at Tuesday’s meeting in support of making better decisions on homelessness, denouncing the city’s methods of evicting people from public spaces. Kemper Stone said he was previously unhoused, and thinks that the city must work harder alongside unhoused people. He said that he’s been treated better living in temporary hotel rooms than he is now in a subsidized supportive housing situation. 

“In that situation, if you make suggestions or ask questions or present ideas, you get on the cootie list and they’ll find a way to evict you,” Stone said. “You need people who are embedded in a situation rather than seven levels up in the hierarchy with no contact with the reality of the thing, guessing what is required or what they would prefer rather than what is needed.”

The city council will meet again Tuesday to discuss whether to amend the capital improvement budget to use more than $24 million in grant and Measure P funds on repairs of the Mare Island Causeway bridge. This plan is part of a package of proposed road repair projects that will take place this summer.

Vallejo staff plan to hold a budget study session on March 22 to create the 2025-26 budget, preceded by a community survey, and followed by a second session April 12. The proposed budget must be published by May 15, to complete a revised budget on June 10.