From: Sonja Berndt
To: Gao, Beilei; Hampton, Tyron; Lyon, Jason; Madison, Steve; Rivas, Jessica Cc: Márquez, Miguel; Wong, Jim
Subject: ED Tech Mtg. 5/20/2025 Correspondence on Agenda #1B Date: Tuesday, May 20, 2025 2:09:40 PM
Attachments: FY 2026 Proposed Housing Dept. Operating Budget.pdf [ ] CAUTION: This email was delivered from the Internet. Do not click links or open attachments unless you know the content is safe. Report phish using the Phish Alert Button. For more information about the Phish Alert Button view article "KB0011474" on the DoIT portal.
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Please see the attached correspondence for Agenda #1B for today's ED Tech meeting and ensure that it becomes part of the public record. Thank you.
Sonja Berndt
Pasadena
1 SONJA K. BERNDT
Pasadena, CA
May 20, 2025
Chairperson Tyron Hampton
Members of the ED Tech Committee
Pasadena, CA
(By Email)
(By Email [email protected])
Re: Economic Development & Technology Committee Meeting May 20, 2025, Agenda Item #1B: The Recommended FY 2026 Housing Department Operating Budget
Dear Members of the ED Tech Committee:
A. Introduction
I am a long-time resident of Pasadena and a longtime advocate for the unsheltered residents of our City. This letter is to express my deep concern about the FY 2026 Recommended Housing Department Operating Budget. Year after year, the Housing Department receives de minimus General Fund appropriations while the Pasadena Police Department (PPD) receives a grossly disproportionate level of General Fund appropriations. Critical services for our unhoused and especially our unsheltered residents are vastly underfunded because our Housing Department receives only “crumbs” from City-generated sources to serve our most vulnerable residents.
B. Critical Problems with the Housing Department’s Budget
1. Inadequate Funding from City-Generated Sources, Including the City’s General Fund
The Recommended FY 2026 Operating Budget shows the following appropriations from the General Fund:
• Police Department: $111,285,954 (91.7% of its total proposed FY2026 appropriations)
2 • Housing Department: $2,638,887 (2.4% of its total proposed FY2026 appropriations)
The Pasadena Homeless Count has not improved per Point-in-Time Homeless Counts (which the department recognizes is an undercount as compared to the annual homeless count).
o 2022 - total = 512; unsheltered = 280
o 2024 – total = 556; unsheltered = 321
Year after year our City fails to move the needle in the right direction because it fails to provide funding for any meaningful interim and permanent housing to end homelessness in our City.
2. Extreme and Imprudent Reliance on Federal Grant Funding to Fund Programs for Our City’s Unhoused Residents
While the Housing Department receives grant funding from county, state, and federal governments, Housing Department staff has already warned the City Council that federal grant funding is currently substantially at risk due to proposed cuts in the federal budget and the policies of the Trump administration. At the City Council meeting May 5, 2025, City Manager Marquez specifically referenced the draconian cuts currently in the proposed federal budget for services for our most vulnerable residents. Additionally, Housing Department staff told the City Council at its May 19, 2025 meeting that all of the City’s Measure A Local Solutions Funding will have to be used to continue to fund Emergency Housing Vouchers (currently funded by the federal government) because the federal government will stop funding those vouchers at the end of this year. These funds, which could have strengthened our homelessness programs, are now unavailable for our unsheltered residents.
YET, the proposed FY2026 Housing Department Operating Budget notes 76% of its $48,814,656 Operating Budget as coming from the federal government! This shows a clear lack of planning and preparation for expected challenges.
Thankfully, some City Council members support creating an emergency fund to be used if the federal government makes good on its promise to cut funding for the poor. That needs to be done on an urgent basis.
3. The Court’s Decision in the Grants Pass Case Requires Greater Funding to House Our Unsheltered Neighbors
3 The Supreme Court’s Grants Pass decision permits cities to arrest and cite persons for sleeping on public property even if, as in Pasadena, there are a grossly insufficient number of beds/units to provide them with shelter. Some on the City Council have stated that unhoused persons will not be arrested in our City for sleeping on public property. However, the City’s proposal for a Homeless Court would have allowed citations and required unsheltered folks to go through a court process in order to receive interim housing. This is nonsensical. If you provide the housing FIRST, there is no need for PPD calls for service, citations, prosecutors, defense counsel and court staff. Simply provide local funding for the housing sorely needed by our unsheltered residents without the court process.
C. The City Has the Money Now to Urgently and Substantially Increase Funding for Additional Interim and Permanent Housing for Our Unhoused Residents • General Fund
o Cost savings can be achieved by decreasing the number of PPD officers while maintaining public safety in our City. In FY 2021, there were 5,766 PPD calls for service listed as “transient-related.” I once asked former Chief of Police John Perez how many calls for service PPD received from Centennial Place, a City housing site that houses formerly unhoused individuals. He said, “almost none.” Instead of incurring the huge expense of responding to calls for service related to unhoused individuals, PROVIDE HOUSING FOR THEM.
• Additional revenue from FY2025
o At the May 5th opening of the public hearing on the proposed FY2026 Operating Budget, Director of Finance Hawkesworth gave a PowerPoint presentation to the Council with slides showing many one-time expenditures proposed to be funded with a total of $10.6 million in additional revenue received in FY2025. Housing for our unhoused was not on that list of proposed expenditures but clearly should be. • City’s Operating Reserve (5% of annual expenditures). o The City has a $16.184 million Operating Reserve for FY2026. Given the urgent need for more interim and permanent housing, funding from the Operating Reserve is required.
4 o Significantly, in FY2020 and 2021, the City approved $21.5 million (total) to cover the Rose Bowl debt because the Rose Bowl Operating Company could not make the annual debt payments related to the massive remodel of the Rose Bowl years ago. All of those funds were from the City’s General Fund AND GENERAL FUND RESERVES. • City’s Emergency Reserve (15% of annual expenditures) o The City has a $48.552 million Emergency Reserve for FY2026. Given the urgent need for much more interim and permanent housing for our unhoused, funds from the City’s Emergency Reserve for FY2026 should be allocated to the Housing Department for that purpose.
D. Conclusion
In conclusion, our City has chronically underfunded the Housing Department’s programs to provide housing for our unhoused residents and, in particular, our unsheltered residents. The City Council as a whole needs to undertake a serious examination of the proposed FY2026 Operating Budget to find additional General Fund funding for the Housing Department to develop the interim and permanent housing desperately needed to house our unhoused residents. The Council also needs to approve additional funding for this purpose from the FY2026 Operating Reserve, the FY2026 Emergency Reserve and from the $10 million in additional revenue from FY2025.
Thank you for your consideration of this letter.
Sincerely,
/s/
Sonja K. Berndt, Esq. (retired)
Cc: Miguel Marquez, City Manager