Menlo Park: Doing the Math
By Francesca Wodtke
MENLO PARK, Feb. 16 - Last weekend, City Council placed the future of Menlo Park in citizens' hands. Year after year of disappointing revenues have left Menlo Park in financial straights. So at a community budget workshop, held at the Burgess Recreation Center, residents were invited to try doing the math themselves in an effort to check the City's growing budget deficit.
Since 2001, the City's budget has been steadily falling due to decreased sales tax revenues. The most recent estimates show that revenues have dropped by half, from just over $12 million in 2001 to just over $6 million in 2005.
Although the City has already cut staff positions and reduced the City budget by about $4 million over the past five years, cutting spending is not enough. The City needs to consider cutting community programs and City services if it is to make ends meet. But which programs and which services? That decision lay with participants at the budget workshop.
City Finance Director, Carol Augustine attributes the drop in sales tax revenues to the departure and closure of several Menlo Park-based high tech companies. "During the dot-com boom," she said, "a lot of high tech company headquarters were based in Menlo Park. We generated sales tax revenue from those, but it's been going down since 2001." She adds that the drop has "leveled off now" although it's unlikely that the city will "get their sales tax back."
Re-located car dealerships are also part of the problem according to Augustine. "Five years ago, we had about five car dealerships. They used to be the second-largest generator of sales tax for Menlo Park." Recently, however, the dealerships have begun moving out towards the highway. In 2003-04, there was an entire line-up of dealerships on El Camino Real, Menlo Park's main artery, now only one dealership and a used car lot remain.
Last year, City Council decided that it had no option but to build the 2006-07 Budget from the ground up.
That's when Menlo Park came up with Your City/Your Decision - a program designed to allow residents to speak up about which city services matter the most to them, and to give residents the chance to try their hand at cutting the budget.
The first phase of Your City/Your Decision , carried out last September, invited residents to participate in a survey to explain how they would balance the budget. With the resulting data, the city developed a list of budget-balancing strategies.
The second phase carried out this month consisted of three community workshops, where residents in small groups of about six, deliberated over the budget-balancing strategies to develop their own preferences on how they would cut costs.
Ultimately budget cut decisions will rest with the City Council, but the results of the workshops will be used by the City Council to gauge community preferences.
"We love everything," explained Augustine referring to city services and programs, "but there's balancing to do and the Council needs to know what's important to citizens, and what they'll pay more for." By including Menlo Park residents in the preliminary deliberation process, the Council will get a sense of what matters most to them. The workshop was also designed to raise awareness amongst community members about why the budget needs to be cut.
At the workshop, Mayor Nicholas Jellins explained to participants that with the current budget deficit, the City is losing $2.9 million annually. He said, "We cannot afford to provide the current level of services ... but before we cut the budget, it is critical to gather input, to consider which services are important, and which are not."
Minutes later, community members gathered at round tables to deliberate together in council-like settings. Each group was tasked with deciding which resources and programs to cut and where to increase costs. The sectors considered included Public Safety including police presence and patrol response; Public Works including park maintenance, road works and environmental programs; Community Services including child care, youth, adult and senior programs, sports and aquatics, events and concerts; Libraries; and Community Development including comprehensive planning.
Participants also worked on tax strategies.
The proposed cuts varied widely. Some groups felt that events and concerts could be cut out of the budget completely. Others felt that child care costs were already too high. Still others argued that street lighting could be reduced by half. There was a general overall reluctance to cut public safety.
Frans Honig, a sports coach, and longtime resident of Menlo Park said, "the idea of eliminating golf and sports, to me, was ridiculous." He was hoping to keep after-school sports programs and claimed that childcare issues are most important. "Some people don't understand the impact of cutting childcare services. With both parents working - the mom and the dad - individuals do need childcare services. Some people don't understand that."
Resident, Anna Zara said it was hard to understand the impact these cuts would have on the community overall. "It's excruciating to think of Menlo Park becoming a non-safe place for children." She also noted her interest in community services such as adult sports and aquatics. "They are what makes the community. Without them, you end up looking outside the neighborhood for activities, and then you are left without a community at all."
Eric Kinney, son of former Council Member Chuck Kinney, and who unsuccessfully ran for City Council in 2003, said that Menlo Park money should not be spent on non-Menlo Park residents. He felt the City should raise fees for non-residents using the Burgess School Age Child Care Program, and that a fee should be charged to non-residents using the senior transportation program. He also noted that Menlo Park pensions and staff salaries needed to be addressed.
Once all the data is gathered from the workshops, it'll be up to the City Council to apply it as it sees fit. The next fiscal year is set to begin in June 2006. And the 2006-07 Budget will need to be approved by May.
Contact Francesca Wodtke at wodtke@stanford.edu
