The Desert Hot Springs has been focusing on their finances recently though council members said recently that they may not have a completed budget by July 1st. The city held two lengthy meetings this week, and will hold another one this Thursday night, but despite their efforts, three council members are not so sure they can agree on the significant cuts that need to be made.
The city needs to figure out how to cut $1.6 million from the budget for this upcoming fiscal year. While that may seem like a daunting task, Mayor Pro Tem Russell Betts said that the city is close, but that the point of contention is the city’s police department. Officials can’t settle on a specific amount to spend on public safety.
The only definitive decision made by the council so far this week is that they want to be able to have control over the city’s administrative services director rather than having the position be controlled by the city manager. They hope this will prevent issues they’ve had in the past where the city manager was able to override the administrative services department and the accounting department. Betts said he expected other cities to follow suit in this decision, though Council Member Scott Matas opposed the decision, saying that if the administrative services director and city manager failed to agree on an issue, there could be a “political uproar.”
The Riverside County Sheriff’s Department submitted a contract proposal to the city in May. The city would pay $5.9 million to contract with the department, which would make the option of the sheriff’s department cheaper and more comprehensive than the local police’s $6.4 million cost estimate.
The problem is, Desert Hot Springs cannot legally switch police forces without negotiating with the local police union.
Council Member Jan Pye suggested tabling the sheriff’s department issue until a later time, since the council still had so many other issues to discuss. She said the budget is “a hard nut to crack,” but that the council will get there eventually, just not by Thursday.
Matas suggested that they get the budget passed, and then continue to work out the cuts over the next few months. Though Betts disagreed, saying he would not vote for an unbalanced budget, and that he’d rather continue the budget talks into the next fiscal year.
Read more about the city’s budget here.