LB mayor, city manager continue push for approval of bond measure
September 11th, 2008 · No Comments
BY NICK DIAMANTIDES
Staff Writer
On Monday night, Long Beach Mayor Bob Foster and City Manager Pat West continued their efforts to persuade the voters of the city to approve a bond measure to raise money for infrastructure repairs. The two spoke at the Wrigley Association's monthly meeting at the community center of Veterans Park. About 80 people- including several city council members, candidates for state office, other city officials and community activists, were in the audience.
Foster began by explaining that the budget process was long and difficult, but city officials were required by law to produce a balanced budget. The city currently has an approximately $17 million deficit in its 2008-09 General Fund budget necessitating cutbacks in every city department supported by that fund.
The mayor told the audience that he wanted to give his perspectives on the proposed bond measure, referred to as Measure I and/or Proposition I, in order to explain why he and most city officials feel that it is necessary. He noted that former California Governor George Deukmejian and former Long Beach Mayor Beverly O'Neill both support the measure.
Foster noted that Long Beach has a $3.1 billion budget, and all that money goes into specific funds as required by the city's charter. Those funds support the Port of Long Beach, the gas department, the water department and other operations that are vital to the city. The General Fund contains approximately $404 million, and it is that fund that supports the police, fire, public works, library, park recreation and marine departments as well as all other offices and departments based in City Hall. "When you remove public safety- fire and police, which is a little more than two-thirds of the General Fund budget- you're left with $125 million to do everything else," Foster explained. "There's $3 million in that budget for what you would call infrastructure- that's streets, sidewalks, sewers, storm water systems, park structures and public safety facilities."
The mayor noted that the city gets additional funds from the state for road maintenance and repair and also uses other one-time revenue sources for infrastructure improvements.
"If you added up all the infrastructure work that we need in this city, it would come to nearly a billion dollars after you subtract federal and state money that we are getting for those items," Foster said. He stressed that the city only has a tiny fraction of the money necessary to meet its infrastructure needs and explained that studies conducted during the past decade have shown the continual deterioration of the city's streets, sidewalks, sewers and structures as well as the steadily increasing costs of the labor and materials necessary for the repairs.
"The time has come to fix our infrastructure," Foster insisted. "We cannot attract business and have the safety, convenience and appearance that we all want without fixing it."
Reiterating the fact that there was no way the General Fund could pay for the needed improvements, Foster said city officials had scaled back the upgrades to include only the most essential projects, which would cost $571 million to be spent over the course of the next 10 years. He added that proposals to pay for infrastructure improvements by drastically cutting back the salaries and benefits of all city employees would lead to a mass exodus of highly skilled personnel. That, in turn, according to Foster, would result in inefficiencies and delays in city operations that would harm the quality of life for all Long Beach residents.
"I am asking you to help solve [this problem]," Foster said. "I am asking you to tax yourselves." About two months ago, at Foster's request, the Long Beach City Council voted to put Measure I on the November ballot. The measure would authorize the issuance of $571 million in bonds to be paid back through the imposition of a $120 tax on all residences in the city for the next 30 years. Commercial and industrial property owners would pay a tax based on square footage. The mayor noted that, by law, the money raised could only be used for infrastructure improvements in the city.
"This is a good thing for the city, and I do not see any other way that this could be done," Foster added. "I urge you to support this and to carefully consider the kind of city you want us to be."
After Foster's presentation, West took the microphone. He noted that the entire city manager's office and all city department heads were in total support of Measure I. "Everybody wants to fix stuff, to solve problems, to help our community," he said, offering an example of how infrastructure improvements can greatly improve an area. "Recently we repaved all of 7th Street from Redondo Avenue all the way to Pacific Coast Highway," he said, explaining that the public works department closed off that section of 7th Street two weekends in a row to expedite the repaving process. "I can't tell you how proud the residents and business folks were to have that done in just two weeks," West said. He also described street repairs in other sections of the city.
West told the audience that if the voters approve Measure I, dramatic infrastructure improvements will be seen throughout the city. "If you give us this opportunity, we will respond, and we can do this work," he said. "It's been a miserable thing to see our infrastructure just deteriorating and deteriorating and we [have not] had the ability to do anything about it because the dollars are so scarce."
After West's initial comments, he and Foster took turns answering questions from the audience for about an hour. They explained that if the voters approve the bond measure, street and structure repairs could begin as early as January 2009.
