Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2004. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
San Francisco Chronicle - July 5, 2004
Ryan Kim at rkim@sfchronicle.com.
Flush with an additional $4 million in extra property transfer taxes and an additional $2 million in revised property tax projections, the committee early Saturday morning voted 2-1 on the revised budget, which will go to the full board on July 27 for approval. The added revenue, based on a recent upswing in property sales, was announced late Friday night by the city controller.
The extra property tax revenue was added to an additional $11 million in cuts and savings measures the Board of Supervisors budget committee made to the mayor's $5 billion spending plan over the past few weeks. Given the extra money, the three-person committee worked until 4 a.m. Saturday to help restore and implement a number of the board's policy priorities, including HIV and AIDS support services, jail health services, emergency funds for children, and community violence prevention programs.
The budget committee also reallocated $11 million in nongeneral fund money, providing $3.3 million in youth employment services and $2.3 million for the Department of Public Health's dialysis center.
Supervisor Jake McGoldrick, a member of the budget committee, said health care received the bulk of the reallocations, in line with the concerns of residents.
"The people we want to thank are the couple of thousand people who came through the door and, through their e-mails and phone calls, we knew that the health care issue was a top priority for the community," McGoldrick said Saturday afternoon.
Newsom's original budget sought to erase a $307 million deficit through a combination of layoffs, department consolidations, service reductions, and higher fees and taxes. The mayor's budget director, Ben Rosenfield, said that while the revised budget won't erase every job loss or service cut, he appreciated the budget committee's hard work.
"They've put in long hours to review our proposals, and in many ways they have come up with alternatives that we are completely supportive of," he said.
A few big winners emerged. The Department of Public Health received $1.7 million for the Ryan White AIDS Care Service, $1.75 million for primary care clinics and $1.5 million for jail health services. The Department of Children, Youth and Their Families received $2 million for an emergency service fund for children. Capital improvements for the Recreation and Park Department and increases in homeless services and community-based violence prevention in high- risk areas all got $1 million apiece.
Some smaller additions included $60,000 for a Russian-speaking liaison in the mayor's office and $100,000 for a beacon center in the Richmond District.
Besides voting on the budget, the Board of Supervisors must also approve several fund-raising proposals by the mayor that already have been factored into this year's budget. These include a quarter-cent sales increase and a business tax restructuring plan that must go before voters in November.
"We need to have the sales tax increase," McGoldrick said. "We're dependent on that, or we'll have to go back midyear and make some more cuts."
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