B
udget and Audit Committee Report
915 I Street, 1st Floor
Sacramento, CA 95814
www.cityofsacramento.org
File ID: 2022-00934 May 31, 2022 Discussion Item 06 T
itle: Measure U Community Advisory Committee Recommendations Regarding Fiscal Year (FY) 2022/23 Proposed Budget
Locat
ion: Citywide
R
ecommendation: Receive and file.
C
ontact: Ash Roughani, Special Projects Manager, (916) 808-7751, [email protected], Office of the City Manager P
resenter: Members of the Measure U Community Advisory Committee A
ttachments:
1-Description/Analysis
2-Measure U Committee FY2022/23 Proposed Budget Recommendations
Description/Analysis
I
ssue Detail: The Mayor and City Council established the Measure U Community Advisory Committee (Measure U Committee) in 2018 to ensure that the expenditures of City resources reflect Council and Community priorities (Resolution 2018-0393).
O
n May 6, 2022, the Measure U Committee presented its priorities and recommendations for the FY2022/23 budget year. The Measure U Committee drafted its priorities prior to publication of the City Manager’s FY2022/23 Proposed Budget (Proposed Budget). Subsequently, at its May 16, 2022 meeting, the Measure U Committee adopted follow-up recommendations in response to the Proposed Budget (Attachment 2).
P
olicy Considerations: City Council Resolution 2018-0393 adopted October 2, 2018 outlines the purpose, and the powers and duties of the Measure U Committee. Specifically, the Resolution states, to ensure that the expenditures of City resources reflect Council and community priorities, the Committee shall review, report, and make non-binding recommendations on revenue and expenditures of certain funds from the Transactions and Use Tax (Sacramento City Code chapter 3.27.).
E
conomic Impacts: None.
E
nvironmental Considerations:
C
alifornia Environmental Quality Act (CEQA): This report concerns administrative activities and governmental fiscal activities that do not constitute a “project” as defined by the CEQA Guidelines Sections 15378(b)(2) and 15378(b)(4) and are not subject to the provisions of CEQA (CEQA Guidelines Section 15060(c)(3)).
S
ustainability: None.
C
ommission/Committee Action: The recommendations in this report were approved by the Measure U Committee on May 16, 2022.
R
ationale for Recommendation: None.
Fi
nancial Considerations: Council may need to reallocate existing commitments to implement the Committee’s recommendations and maintain a balanced budget.
Local
Business Enterprise (LBE): None.
May 16, 2022
Mayor and CouncilmembersCity of SacramentoNew City Hall915 I StreetSacramento, CA 95815 RE: Measure U Recommendations to Council FY 22/23 - REVISED Dear Mayor Steinberg and Councilmembers:
City Council Resolution 2018-0393 adopted October 2, 2018, outlines the purpose and thepowers and duties of the Measure U Committee specifically, "to ensure that the expenditures ofCity resources reflect Council and community priorities, the committee shall review, report, andmake non-binding recommendations on revenue and expenditures of certain funds from theTransactions and Use Tax (Sacramento City Code chapter 3.27.)".In addition to services previously supported by the original Measure U, the 2018 ballot initiativespecified the following uses: "other essential services, including homeless supportive services,affordable housing, libraries, park maintenance, high-wage job promotion, and youthprogramming."When the City Council adopted the FY2021/22 Operating Budget, the Councildirected the City Manager to realign the Measure U expenditures to better reflect Council’spriorities for the use of the revenues.We acknowledgethe City's response to our request tobreak out Measure U expenditures thus allowing the community to clearly see how the fundsare being allocated.A guiding question for the Committee in developing these recommendations is: What servicesare we able to provide that we weren’t able to provide before the 2018 Measure U was passedto meet the most pressing needs in our communities?Under this authorization and with this guiding framework, we provide the followingrecommendations regarding the 2022-2023 budget.Metrics:We appreciate the City including metricsin the budget; however, we look forward tothe City publishing a dashboard with the City's performance measures (defined outcomes andassessment of progress listed onpage 41-43of the21/22 budget). We want to reiterate theimportance of systematically tracking performance metrics that describe the outcomes (how wellprograms are functioning and their human impact) and not just inputs and outputs of Cityoperations. We also reiterate a previous recommendation to conduct a neighborhood analysisof equity in investments. Additionally, it would be helpful to have a Spending Database for theCity. This would provide a mechanism to have a better idea of investments by neighborhood,income, race/ethnicity, and language spoken and to develop geographic- anddemographic-specific plans for future spending.
Additionally, with the change in the Measure U Budget this year, the Department of CommunityResponse is funded by Measure U. The Department was established in part to shift theemergency response for 911 calls related to homelessness and mental health away from thepolice department to a workforce trained to provide appropriate response and navigation towraparound services. In November,we requested dataon 911 calls for servicefrom the Councilto help guide our recommendations for the budget and were not provided the data we requested. As a first step to using metrics to guide budgetary and programmaticdecision-making, we are requesting that the Council direct staff to provide the data ourCommittee requested and share with us how many calls are being transferred from the policedepartment to the Department of Community Response so that appropriate budgetaryadjustments can be made accordingly.
Participatory Budgeting [$5.5 million]:We recommend$5.5 million in additional funding forcommunity-identified projects with at least $500,000 additional for consultants, outreachactivities/media, and evaluation. Starting inFebruary2020, the Committee requested $5 millionfor Participatory Budgeting. That figure was developed with an understanding that the City ofVallejo (a city with less than 25% of the population of Sacramento) made an investment of $1million ($8.24 per resident). However, when we learned that Seattle (a city 50% larger inpopulation size than Sacramento) made an investment of $30 million ($41.39 per resident) forParticipatory Budgeting, weincreased our requestto $15 million.
We were pleased that the Council approved $1 million for the pilot and $225,000 forimplementation costs in the 2021/22 budget to launch the pilot in two neighborhoods inSacramento. The current pilot is in the idea collection phase and has an evaluation plan andperformance metrics will be provided to the Council at the conclusion of the pilot. While theevaluation data are not yet available, some of the initial experiential data indicate that a futureround of the project would benefit from additional funding to pay for outreach and communityengagement activities as well as a larger pot of money for project implementation; unfortunately,$500,000 per region limits the type of projects that can be funded in a multi-neighborhood area.Furthermore, given the initial interest and enthusiasm about the initiative and the Mayor’ssuggestion that this process should be applied to the entire budget, we are requesting theCouncil to increase their investment and commitment for an additional year.
Small Business support [$800,000]:For façade improvementgrants to allow businesses /property owners to apply for funds to fix vandalized windows and doors that are often destroyedafter hours or during a business burglary. One suggestion to ensure access is to use a rankingsystem that would prioritize the geographical areas where there has been historical lack ofpublic investment to ensure that this type of programming would reach across the city to ensurethe areas of our city that don’t have PBIDs (e.g. Gardenland/Northgate, North Sac, Freeport,Meadowview) have access to the funding.
Affordable Housing:We recommend that funding be spenton direct financial investments todrive state and federal match dollars for affordable housing and homelessness prevention bysupporting Sacramento residents in maintaining housing through mortgage and rentalassistance and providing additional gap funding for new affordable housing developments.
We further recommend allocating Measure U funds to the Affordable Housing Trust Fund beused for purposes that include: home repair and waived code enforcement fees for elderlyand/or low-income homeowners, first-time home buyers’ program, homelessness preventionprograms and living-wage jobs enterprise efforts to support housing affordability for historicallyunderserved neighborhoods, e.g. Glen Elder, Gardenland, Del Paso Heights, Meadowview.
Homelessness:Continue to allocate Measure U fundsfor direct programs and servicesresponsible for moving individuals and families into more stable environments, addressingbarriers, and moving people from homelessness to housing. We reiterate our recommendationfrom theFY 21-22 mid-year letterthat funding bespent to expand service provision beyondwomen and children under 14 to include older children, people of other genders, and veterans; and add to the allocation toRespite Centersto expand the availability of shelter for inclementweather and Safe Ground sites. In addition, directly funding the development of permanentsupportive housing including through Project Homekey and transitional housing is critical to thesuccess of the City’s efforts to end homelessness. Measure U funds should also be directed tosupporting those important efforts.
Senior Services:We have a growing elderly populationin Sacramento with unique needs thatthe city should identify and support. We recommend funding be spent to expand the servicehours, geographic availability, and language access to services such as Hart Senior Center,Triple R Program, 50+ Wellness Program, Caring Neighborhoods Program, StanfordSettlement, Tech Connections, and Information and Assistance Program.
Youth:We are pleased that funds from Measure U havebeen invested in youth. TheCommittee recommends that the Council continue to prioritize investing in programs andservices for youth, especially those from historically underserved communities provided by theCity and in partnership with community-based organizations, to ensure community well-being.We recommend that funding be spent to expand programming for youth K-12, youth under 26,culturally relevant services for Native and Hmong youth as well as youth from refugee familiesand to support a protected and earmarked city fund for children and youth.
Expanding on the recommendation above for performance metrics, [contained within] theSpending Database for the City should include a list of organizations that have received fundingfrom the youth development grant program and the zip codes of the youth served to understandand assure that MU funds are being used to serve the communities with demonstrated needand to make recommendations for future funding to fill gaps.
Community Investment:We want to emphasize the importantrole of Community Centers inserving a variety of neighborhoods and demographics and encourage the Council to considerincreasing investments in their services and operations.
We also reiterate previous recommendations to only include in the youth line item investmentsthat arespecificto youth. Some investments – whichwe support and are important parts of cityinfrastructure – are best categorized as general Community Investments: examples includeAquatics, Camp Sacramento, and the Sacramento Zoo.
Violence Prevention: The Committee recommends providingadditional funding forcommunity-based violence prevention programs that operate externally to the police departmentand span in range from primary prevention for at-risk youth and adults to intervention andanti-recidivism services for system-impacted youth and adults. The Committee further suggeststhat the funds be provided to existing partners with expertise and a proven track record inproviding these services as well offering capacity-building funding to burgeoning organizationsto expand the service providers in Sacramento. Furthermore we recommend that programutilization data be collected by age and zip code to help guide future investments.
Youth Job Skill Development(inclusive economic development): The Committee focusedits attention on bolstering an existing program: Thousand Strong. Currently participation is lowand costly to employers. We recommended the City partner with an organization that has aproven track record of success with youth job development. By doing so could turn this into ameaningful and effective job training program for youth.Arts/Creative Edge: We recommend Measure U investmentsin this category be focused onyouth in traditionally underserved communities.
Library:The Committee wants to emphasize the importanceof the services provided bylibraries – one of the few public spaces that do not require a fee for entry or require patrons topurchase goods or services as a condition of use. While the Committee recognizes that thelibraries are governed by a Joint Powers Agreement involving entities outside of the City, giventhat libraries were specifically named in the Measure U ballot, we recommend increasing theinvestment in libraries and that the voting members of the JPA advocate for applying thesefunds to respond to community needs and use patterns. Increased funding might be spent toexpand services such as operating hours, print and online catalog, internet access, and otherspecialized programming.Branding Measure U Funding:In the mid-year 21/22 recommendations, the Committeerecommended that the City brand Measure U investments in the city by directing staff to developa logo, identify sign placement and assess printing and installation costs. We are pleased thatthe City adopted our recommendation to develop a logo as well as a communication plan thatwill be utilized by all departments receiving Measure U funds.
Thank you for considering these recommendations and for the opportunity to serve ourcommunity in this important endeavor.
Sincerely,
The Measure U Community Advisory Committee