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San Ramon City Council
April 14, 2026

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Supplemental Material
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April 14, 2026
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Supplemental Public Comment
Item No 5.4
FY 2026-27
Master Fee Schedule
Adoption
City of San Ramon
City Council Meeting
April 14, 2026
Item No. 8.1 Master Fee Schedule Presentation
Background:
• Establish fees: State of CA GC Sections 65104, 65909.5, and 66014
• Purpose of fees: Offset cost of providing services
• Purpose of annual review: Review reasonable basis to calculate cost of providing services or use of facilities
• Timing: In conjunction with the Budget Development
2 Background - Continued:
• Timeline of Council Actions:
• April 23, 2024: Adopted the User Fee Study and Cost Allocation Plan conducted by Matrix Consulting Group to set fees for FY 2024-25.
• March 10, 2026:
• Approved the Nexus Fee Study conducted by David Taussig and Associates (DTA) for development fees.
• Provided recommendations for the Appeal Fee Structure • Set a Public Hearing Date for the FY 2026-27 Master Fee Schedule second reading and adoption
3 Master Fee Schedule Overview
• Total Fees: 1,013
• Unchanged: 480
• Adjusted: 521
• New for FY 2026-27: 12
• Out of 521 Adjusted fees:
• 424 Adjusted by CPI of 2.82%
• 30 Adjusted by CCI of 0.6%
• Remaining 67 Adjusted based on actual labor cost, to reflect market rate, and for consistency across locations
• 2 new fees added since March 10, 2026 meeting:
• Collection Agency Administration fee: Per Case, at Actual Cost • Firearm Storage Fee: Per Month, Per case 4
Fee Schedule Clarifications
Firearm Storage Fee Definition:

Firearm storage fees apply when a weapon is confiscated during a call for service. After a five-day grace period, a monthly fee is charged to cover storage, inventory, and compliance costs.

Victims of firearm theft are exempt, and fees are paused during active litigation. Owners receive notice of fees and may sell or transfer the firearm to a licensed dealer.

Park Community Services language clarification:
• “Non-Profit” should read as:

San Ramon Based Non-Profit Organization
• “Resident/Non-Resident Non-Profit” should read as
San Ramon Resident/Non-San Ramon Based
Non-Profit Organization
5 Appeal Fees structure, Per Council Direction
Appeals
Appeal from Zoning Administrator's Decision for Residential Property under SRMC §D7-8
Deposit1,2,3 $1,500
Appeal from Zoning Administrator's Decision for Non- Residential Property under SRMC §D7-8
Deposit1,2,3 $1,500
Appeal from Planning Commission Decision, Land Use, for Residential Property, under SRMC §D7-8
Deposit1,2,3 $2,500
Appeal from Planning Commission Decision, Land Use, for NonResidential Property under SRMC §D7-8 Deposit1,2,3 $2,500
Appeal from Planning Commission Decision, Residential and Mix Use Developments, under SRMC §D7-8
Deposit1,2,3 $2,500
Appeal from Planning Commission Decision, Commercial
Development, (non-residential), under SRMC §D7-8
Deposit1,2,3 $2,500
Appeal Deposit Refund Footnotes:

Only a successful appeal, completely overturning a prior approval, will be eligible for a refund of appeal Deposit paid. 6 Financial Impact
• City Council’s directives have been implemented to fully recover costs of providing services, unless the fees were exempted per the April 2024 study.
• Specific financial impact depends on the type of fee and demand for the service
• Most of the impact deriving from the Nexus Fee Study will be in the Special Revenue funds, not the City’s General Fund
• The Finance Department will continue administering the Master Fee Schedule updates aimed for 100% cost recovery
7 Recommendation
• Adopt the FY 2026-27 Master Fee Schedule as
presented, including the proposed language
clarification for PCS fees as referenced on Slide #5
8 Questions?
9 From: Brian Swanson
To: City Clerk (Public)
Subject: Re: Public Comment: Agenda Item 8.1 — Public Hearing: Resolution No. 2026-047 — Adopting the Master Fee Schedule for Various Municipal Services for FY 2026- 27, and Repealing Resolution No. 2025-036 - City Council Meeting - April 14, 2026 Date: Tuesday, April 14, 2026 12:43:46 PM
Attachments: 2026 San Ramon City Council Goals and Objectives.pdf San Ramon City Council Norms - January 2026.pdf
***| EXTERNAL EMAIL: Think before you click and do not open attachments unless you know they are safe. |*** Hello:

Here are the attachments referenced in my Public Comment: Agenda 8.1 - Public Hearing: Resolution No. 2026-047.

Thank you,
Brian Swanson, AICP
- mobile
On Tue, Apr 14, 2026 at 10:27 AM Brian Swanson > wrote:

City Council:

I submit the following public comments regarding Agenda Item 8.1, the proposed adoption of the Fiscal Year 2026-27 Master Fee Schedule, including the still-unresolved appeal fee issues previously discussed by the City Council.

At the outset, the Council should not approve Resolution No. 2026-047 tonight unless it openly acknowledges on the record that the companion Ordinance 537 item was improperly handled on a separate procedural track, incorporates that ordinance and its supporting materials into the administrative record for this item by reference, and clearly explains whether the City has actually satisfied the applicable statutory notice and disclosure requirements for all fees now proposed in the Fiscal Year 2026-27 Master Fee Schedule, including the two newly added fees. The current packet adds a Collection Agency Administration Fee and a Firearm Storage Fee, but only one of those new fees is meaningfully described. If the City cannot identify, on the record, which notice statute applies to each new fee and whether the required supporting cost data and explanatory materials were timely disclosed under that statute, then the City should sever or defer only those two new fees and return them separately under the correct statutory timeline, rather than again postponing action on the appeal-fee framework.

The opportunity to deliberate on the ordinance and fee schedule together before adoption has already been lost. Council ignored the clear linkage and approved Ordinance 537 separately on March 24, 2026. That remains a serious problem. It does not eliminate the connection between the two approvals; it makes the current record more deficient. The Council should therefore expressly acknowledge that the ordinance and fee schedule were and remain intrinsically linked, that the City chose to separate them procedurally anyway, and that the full administrative record for this item must now include the Ordinance 537 record and the related public comments by incorporation and attachment.

This comment incorporates by reference my prior public comments dated April 22, 2025, November 25, 2025, January 31, 2026, March 10, 2026, and March 24, 2026 regarding the Master Fee Schedule, appeal fees, public process, transparency, and the administrative record. This comment also incorporates by reference my prior written comments on Ordinance 537 submitted on March 10, 2026, my prior written comments on the parkland dedication, parkland impact fee, park and recreation facility impact fee, and open space development impact fee, and my written comments on Agenda Item

5.11 for the March 24, 2026 City Council meeting. Those comments, among others, remain directly relevant here.

This comment must also be read in the context of the attached 2026 City Council Goals and Objectives and the attached January 2026 City Council Norms. Those documents are directly relevant here. If the Council is serious about doing what is best for the community, being prepared, maintaining a secure financial base, sustaining quality of life, enhancing engagement and communication, and balancing land use planning, then this item cannot be treated as just another routine annual fee update.

The City's own public messaging reinforces that broader context. In announcing the City's first Finance Director, the City Manager said the City was looking forward to implementing "sound financial practices," and the new Finance Director said she was impressed by the leadership's determination to address "fiscal sustainability and community quality of life." See the City's February 26, 2025 announcement here: First Director of Finance. The City's Fiscal Year 2026 budget materials acknowledge a continuing structural deficit and a reliance on Measure N revenue to cover it. See: FY26 Budget Process.

Mayor Armstrong's campaign platform emphasizes putting the community first, fiscal accountability, responsible budgeting, and long-term planning. See: Armstrong for Mayor – Priorities. And the recent State of the City discussion again highlighted the structural deficit and the City's stated commitment to "live within our means." See: State of the City 2026 and local summary of the March 2026 address.

The public deserves more discussion of this issue and honest, transparent framing of the City's fiscal health, because that Item No. 8.1 Public Comment
fiscal condition is plainly a major reason for this reworking of methodologies and fees.

To be clear, my comments regarding the two newly added fees are not intended to invite or justify any further delay in resolving the appeal-fee issues. If the City cannot establish proper notice, disclosure, and legal support for those two new fees, it should defer or sever only those fees and proceed separately, rather than again postponing the overdue revision of the appeal-fee framework.

The Council must not accept this memo quietly.

Doing so would confirm — not correct — the City's growing reputation for weak fiscal governance.

The comments below explain why:

A.The April 14, 2026 packet is more complete than the March 24 continuance packet, but it still is not a sufficient deliberative record.

B.The City's earlier failure to meet the statutory notice and posting requirements remains deeply troubling, considering the Council's own norm to "do your homework." C.The two newly added fees are not adequately explained in the packet, and the City has not clearly identified which statutory notice and disclosure requirements govern them.

D.The City separately noticed the April 14 hearing, but that notice does not cure the missing substance, nor the broken procedural continuity caused by separately approving Ordinance 537.

E.The Master Fee Schedule and Ordinance 537 were and remain inseparable, and Council's decision to approve them on different tracks is itself a problem that must be acknowledged in the record.

F.The staff report still does not meaningfully summarize the prior public meetings or workshops on the Master Fee Schedule and appeal fees.

G.If staff relies on PowerPoint presentations, late-distributed writings, or scattered web postings to explain the missing substance, that still creates serious Brown Act, fee-notice, and administrative-record problems.

H.The revised appeal fees are lower, but still unjustifiably high and still not contextually sensitive to San Ramon's development market, surrounding jurisdictional practice, or the nature of the decisions being appealed.

I.The new refund footnote remains far too narrow and continues to discourage meritorious appeals.

J.The appeal-fee descriptions and the appeal process itself remain inadequately explained, uncodified, unreformed, and disconnected from the lived reality of appellants in San Ramon.

K.The City's claim or implication that these fee changes move San Ramon toward full cost recovery or fiscal adequacy is misleading, and full cost recovery is not an ethical or equitable safe harbor.

L.The transportation-fee inflation methodology remains warped, overly generic, and effectively pro-developer.

M.In the context of the City Council's 2026 Goals and Objectives and current Norms, the handling of this item still falls well short of the City's own standards.

N.The Council should not approve this resolution unless it requires a fuller and unified record, expressly incorporates the Ordinance 537 record and related public comments, and requires meaningful reform of the appeal framework.

Transparency, Access, and the Administrative Record
Any materials related to Agenda Item 8.1, and any prior materials related to the March 10, 2026 Master Fee Schedule item, the January 31, 2026 workshop, the March 24, 2026 Ordinance 537 item, and other prior appeal-fee or Master Fee Schedule discussions that staff or the Council relied upon in developing this item, whether provided now or in the future, must be permanently posted on the City's website in HTML and searchable PDF formats, directly adjacent to the agenda item. This includes staff reports, consultant analyses, presentations, workshop materials, retreat materials, fee tables, draft resolutions, appeal-fee proposals, comparable-city analyses, cost-escalation and inflation-index assumptions, and public comments when such materials exist. Public comments must not be fragmented across multiple separate webpages or locations, nor buried behind excessive navigation. Link integrity must be actively maintained so the administrative record remains accessible in perpetuity. Any materials distributed at or shortly before the meeting must be posted online immediately and made available to the public at the same time they are provided to the Council. All documents, emails, spreadsheets, memoranda, slide decks, and materials considered by the Council or staff must be included in the administrative record.

These requirements apply regardless of whether the City has chosen to provide fuller background materials in the current packet.

A.The April 14 packet is more complete than the March 24 continuance packet, but it still is not a sufficient deliberative record.

Unlike the March 24 packet, the April 14 packet now includes a staff report, the proposed Master Fee Schedule, and the attached resolution. It also includes the revised Planning Division appeal deposits and the new refund footnote.

That is an improvement.

But completeness in form is not the same thing as adequacy in substance.

The current packet still does not provide:
a meaningful narrative explaining why the revised appeal-fee amounts are justified in San Ramon's actual development context;
a full action-specific cost basis for each appeal category; a meaningful summary of the prior public discussions on appeal fees and what Council direction actually was; any reform to the underlying appeal process itself;
any explanation of why the refund rule remains so narrow; any cumulative fiscal analysis showing what costs remain unrecovered; or any meaningful explanation of why the inflation and escalation methodologies used in the fee schedule are appropriate for San Ramon's actual infrastructure and service costs.

In other words, the packet is fuller, but the record is still incomplete.

The incompleteness problem also extends to the two new fees added in the current packet. The staff report provides a short paragraph explaining the new Collection Agency Administration Fee as a per-case, actual-cost fee for bad-debt referrals to a collection agency. Still, it offers no comparable explanation for the new Firearm Storage Fee, which the Master Fee Schedule lists as $30 per month. The current packet does not explain what specific event triggers that fee, whether it applies to firearms held as evidence, held for safekeeping, held after a domestic violence incident, held after a psychiatric detention, held pending a California Department of Justice release process, or something else entirely. It also does not explain whether the $30 charge is the only fee, whether it is in addition to any retrieval or release process, or whether the City is conflating ordinary police evidence and safekeeping functions with any local firearms safe-storage enforcement issue. That omission is especially problematic because the City's own Property & Evidence page states that firearms taken for safekeeping after a domestic violence incident or a psychiatric hold may be retrieved only after clearance from the California Department of Justice, and that California law requires firearms to be registered in the owner's name before release. See: Property & Evidence – City of San Ramon Police Department and California Department of Justice – Firearms Reporting & Law Enforcement Release Application. If the new Firearm Storage Fee is intended to apply to firearms already in police custody, the staff report should state this clearly. If it is intended to relate to another enforcement purpose, the staff report should state that clearly as well. As written, the packet mixes apples and oranges. It leaves the public unable to determine who pays this fee, when it applies, what legal authority supports it, and what conduct actually triggers it.

B.The City's earlier failure to meet the statutory notice and posting requirements remains deeply troubling, considering the Council's own norm to "do your homework." Even though the City has now returned with a separately noticed hearing, the earlier failure to meet the necessary timing requirements for the March 24 hearing cannot simply be brushed aside.

That earlier breakdown matters because Government Code section 66016 requires, before levying a new fee or approving an increase in an existing fee or service charge, that the local agency hold at least one open and public meeting and make available at least 10 days prior to the meeting the data indicating the amount of cost, or estimated cost, required to provide the service and the revenue sources anticipated to provide the service, including General Fund revenues: Government Code section 66016.

For planning-agency fees specifically, Government Code section 65104 provides that such fees may not exceed the reasonable cost of providing the service and must be imposed pursuant to section 66016: Government Code section 65104.

And to the extent some fees proceed under the broader Mitigation Fee Act hearing provisions, Government Code section 66018 also applies: Government Code section 66018.

The Council's own January 2026 norms require Councilmembers to be prepared and to do your homework. The Council's 2026 goals also emphasize maintaining a secure financial base and enhancing communication with residents and the business community. The City's failure to set this item up correctly the first time is therefore not a minor procedural hiccup. It is directly inconsistent with the City's own stated standards of preparedness and effective governance.

C.The two newly added fees are not adequately explained, and the City has not shown which statutory notice regime governs them.

The April 14 packet adds two new fees: a Collection Agency Administration Fee and a Firearm Storage Fee of $30 per month. The staff report provides a short paragraph explaining the first new fee as a per-case actual-cost charge for referring delinquent accounts to a collection agency. But the packet provides no comparable substantive explanation at all for the Firearm Storage Fee. The public is left unable to determine what event triggers that fee, who pays it, whether it applies to firearms held as evidence, held for safekeeping, held after a domestic violence incident, held after a psychiatric detention, or something else entirely, and whether it is in addition to any release or retrieval-related process.

That lack of explanation is not just a drafting problem. It raises a notice problem. If these are new fees, the City should identify on the record which statutory notice regime applies to each. If a fee is governed by Government Code section 66016, supporting cost data must have been made available to the public at least 10 days before the meeting, and mailed notice must have been sent to interested parties who requested it 14 days before the meeting. If a fee is governed instead by Government Code section 66018, then the City must have published the hearing notice under Government Code section 6062a, which requires a 10-day publication period. The Brown Act's 72-hour agenda rule is not enough by itself.

Another 14 days is therefore not automatically the answer. The correct answer depends on which statute governs each new fee. But if the City cannot clearly show tonight that it used the right statute, provided the right level of notice, and timely disclosed the necessary supporting information for each new fee. Those two fees should be removed, severed, or deferred and returned separately under the correct statutory timeline. The City separately noticed the April 14 hearing, but that notice does not cure the missing substance or the broken procedural continuity caused by the separate approval of Ordinance 537.

I do not raise these concerns to provide the City with another excuse to delay action on appeal-fee reform. The Collection Agency Administration Fee and the Firearm Storage Fee are analytically separate from the appeal-fee revisions. If the City cannot clearly establish the statutory basis, notice compliance, supporting cost data, and the intended scope of those two new fees. The proper remedy is to remove, sever, or continue only those two fees and return them with a clearer record.

The City should not use those defects as a basis to further postpone action on the appeal-fee issue.

D.The City separately noticed the April 14 hearing, but that notice does not cure the missing substance, nor the broken procedural continuity caused by separately approving Ordinance 537.

The City separately posted a Notice of Public Hearing for the April 14, 2026, Master Fee Schedule hearing and directed the public to the proposed Fiscal Year 2026-27 Master Fee Schedule online. That separate notice was necessary.

But it does not cure the deeper problem.

A separate hearing notice does not supply:
the missing cumulative fiscal context,
the missing full appeal-fee methodology,
the missing explanation of why the refund rule remains so narrow, the missing transportation-fee escalation justification, or the missing narrative tying the current hearing back to the already-adopted Ordinance 537 record.

Nor does it address the City's decision to separate ordinance approval from fee-schedule approval. That separation has already damaged procedural continuity. The hearing notice cannot repair that.

E.The Master Fee Schedule and Ordinance 537 were and remain inseparable, and Council's decision to approve them on different tracks is itself a problem that must be acknowledged in the record.

The Master Fee Schedule provides the operative fee amounts and annual implementation. Ordinance 537 provides the legal code structure through which multiple development fees, fee methodologies, and future adjustments are embedded into the Municipal Code.

One is the operational fee schedule.

The other is the legal framework.

They are inseparable.

Because Ordinance 537 has already been approved, the Council can no longer remedy that problem by hearing both items together in one future vote. But it can and must acknowledge on the record that the two approvals were linked, that Council chose to approve them on separate tracks anyway, and that this hearing must therefore expressly incorporate the Ordinance 537 record and related public comments by reference so the administrative record is not left artificially fragmented.

The Council ignored the clear linkage. That remains a problem.

F.The staff report still does not meaningfully summarize the prior public meetings or workshops on the Master Fee Schedule and appeal fees.

The April 14 staff report states that the Council approved the nexus fee study and gave direction on appeal fee modifications at the March 10 meeting, and now lists the revised appeal deposits and the refund footnote.

But it still does not give the public a meaningful summary of:
what alternatives were considered and rejected;
why these particular appeal-fee numbers were chosen;
why the City retained a deposit model rather than a different approach; why only complete overturn remains refundable;
whether resident and community appellants were considered separately; whether hardship alternatives were fully analyzed;
whether codification of the appeal process was considered and rejected; or whether impartiality safeguards were considered and rejected.

The public is still left to reconstruct the decision path from prior meetings, scattered materials, and memory. That is not a meaningful summary.

G.If staff relies on PowerPoint presentations, late-distributed writings, or scattered web postings to explain the missing substance, that still creates serious Brown Act, fee-notice, and administrative-record problems.

Even with the fuller packet, the City still appears to rely heavily on prior presentations, separate notices, supplemental postings, and other materials outside the face of the current staff report.

That creates continuing problems if those materials are the only place where the public can understand the actual rationale for the fee package.

Government Code section 54954.2 requires that agendas for regular meetings contain a brief general description of each item of business to be transacted or discussed, be posted at least 72 hours beforehand, and generally bars discussion or action on items not appearing on the posted agenda except in narrow circumstances: Government Code section 54954.2.

Government Code section 54957.5 requires public availability of late-distributed writings provided to a majority of the legislative body: Government Code section 54957.5.

And for fee adoption, Government Code section 66016 still requires advance disclosure of the cost data supporting the fees.

The City cannot rely on scattered presentations, separate webpages, and late supplementary materials as a substitute for a coherent and complete public record.

H.The revised appeal fees are lower, but still unjustifiably high and still not contextually sensitive to San Ramon's development market, surrounding jurisdictional practice, or the nature of the decisions being appealed.

The April 14 packet reduces the Planning Division appeal deposits to $1,500 for Zoning Administrator appeals and $2,500 for Planning Commission appeals.

That reduction is not enough.

A Zoning Administrator appeal is, in substance, an appeal from a staff-level determination, not a decision preceded by the same level of appointed or elected public hearing process associated with a Planning Commission or City Council action.

A $1,500 deposit to challenge that kind of staff-level determination remains unjustifiably high.

That matters because the Zoning Administrator process is often not truly public-facing or due-process-rich in the same way as a Planning Commission or City Council hearing. Charging residents $1,500 to obtain a broader review of a staff-level land-use determination still operates as a barrier to due process.

The City's recently posted Toyota SF SDC Project provides a concrete example of why a Zoning Administrator appeal fee must be significantly lower. In the City's own Notice of Pending Development Plan Amendment Application, the City states that the project at 2451 Bishop Drive seeks approval of a Development Plan Amendment and Architectural Review to upgrade the distribution hub, replace and install new access gates, fencing, security features, and add sixty-six (66) new parking spaces within an existing landscaped area adjacent to Bishop Drive. Yet, the City also states that the project is classified as a categorical exemption pursuant to Section 15301 (Existing Facilities) of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) Guidelines and that no formal hearing will be held unless requested in writing by April 23, 2026. See: Notice of Pending Development Plan Amendment Application – Toyota SF SDC Project. The City's own draft Zoning Administrator Order No. 02-26 then repeats that the project does not include new or expanded structures and treats the sitework as minimal even though the proposal includes added parking, paving-related changes, access controls, and circulation modifications. See: Draft Zoning Administrator Order No. 02-26 – Toyota SF SDC Project.

Whether or not one ultimately agrees with the City's CEQA position, this is exactly the type of staff-level approval with significant practical consequences and serious environmental-review questions that demonstrates why a $1,500 appeal deposit for a Zoning Administrator decision remains too expensive. Interested parties and San Ramon constituents should not have to pay that much to obtain broader public review of a project the City intends to approve without a formal hearing and under a categorical exemption that, at minimum, appears to require much more scrutiny than the notice provides.

The same is true of the $2,500 Planning Commission appeal deposits. Those amounts may be lower than before, but they remain large enough to deter many residents, neighborhood groups, and non-applicant appellants from using the appeal process at all.

And these reduced fees are also out of step with nearby jurisdictions. According to the official City of Dublin Planning Division Fee Schedule, a public, non-applicant appeal is $251, while an applicant-filed appeal is processed on a timeand-materials basis. See: City of Dublin Planning Division Fee Schedule, effective July 1, 2025. According to the official City of Pleasanton Master Fee Schedule, an appeal is $349 and is "refunded upon successful appeal." See: City of Pleasanton Master Fee Schedule, effective January 1, 2026. According to the official Town of Danville Master Fee Schedule, appeals are $320. See: Town of Danville Master Fee Schedule, Fiscal Year 2025/26. And even the City of Lafayette, which City staff previously highlighted despite its markedly different development profile, charges $175 for an "appeal of staff determination." In contrast, "appeals or reconsiderations" are 75% of the application fee. See: City of Lafayette Planning Fees, effective February 6, 2026.

That means San Ramon's new $1,500 Zoning Administrator appeal deposit is still roughly 4 to 6 times higher than Danville's, Pleasanton's, and Dublin's published appeal fees, and more than 8 times higher than Lafayette's published appeal-of-staff-determination fee. The $2,500 Planning Commission deposit is higher still. Those are not trivial differences. They confirm that San Ramon remains an outlier, even among nearby jurisdictions with active development markets. That outlier status is especially significant because San Ramon is also one of the jurisdictions facing the most concentrated redevelopment pressure, meaning the practical exclusionary effect of an appeal deposit is greater here, not less.

These reduced fees still aren't contextually sensitive to San Ramon's actual development market. They do not reflect the City's unusually concentrated development power structure, the dominant landholding role of Sunset Development in the downtown core, the extraordinary amount of redevelopment already approved, or the diminished practical value of delayed fee changes now that so much redevelopment has already been approved. Bishop Ranch materials state that Bishop Ranch is situated on 585 acres in the San Ramon Valley and that Sunset Development Company is its owner and manager. See: https://tenants.bishopranch.com/complex/br3/.

I.The new refund footnote remains far too narrow and continues to discourage meritorious appeals.

The new footnote states that only a successful appeal that completely overturns a prior approval will be eligible for a refund of the appeal deposit.

That remains much too narrow.

Many meritorious appeals do not result in total reversal. They result in:
corrected findings,
modified conditions,
narrower approvals,
revised project features,
additional mitigation,
or partial relief that materially changes the outcome.

An appeal that forces meaningful correction is not a failure.

A refund rule that recognizes only total overturning as success discourages legitimate appeals and continues to place the public in an all-or-nothing posture that benefits project proponents and the City, not residents.

J.The appeal-fee descriptions and the appeal process itself remain inadequately explained, uncodified, unreformed, and disconnected from the lived reality of appellants in San Ramon.

The fee descriptions remain too thin.

The Master Fee Schedule still does not give the public a full, plain-language understanding of:
what decisions are appealable;
what materials are required;
what standard of review applies;
the deposit replenishment risk;
what hearing procedures govern;
how refunds are decided; and
what impartiality safeguards apply?
That matters because the fee schedule is being approved without any parallel reform of the appeal process itself.

The City still has not used this item to codify the detailed appeal process in the Municipal Code and Zoning Ordinance or to explain it clearly on the City's website and forms.

And this is not just an abstract procedural concern. As evidenced by my unsuccessful appeal of the Orchards Development Project, the City is using its own sequencing, hearing cadence, bureaucratic process advantage, and self-driven approval calendar to treat the appeal-fee process as an entirely separate issue. That is not the lived reality for San Ramon constituents or potential appellants. Just like Ordinance 537, the associated appeal-fee process is obviously linked to the Master Fee Schedule and should have been approved in unison with the revision to appeal fees. Instead, the City's sequencing decisions have allowed it to isolate the fee process from the actual burdens appellants face.

While the public is required to pay for access to appeal, the process is not fair, clear, easily understandable, or fully transparent.

The City's repeated characterization or implication that an appeal to the City Council is a truly de novo hearing is not credible. Existing documents reviewed by the Planning Commission are already posted publicly on the City's website. The City's own Official Meetings & Notices page states that full agendas, minutes, and videos are posted on the San Ramon Agenda & Minutes Portal. Those project pages, such as Marketplace, expressly provide links to Planning Commission agenda packets, available minutes, videos, and appeal documents. See:
https://www.sanramon.ca.gov/how_do_i_/get_involved/official and https://www.sanramon.ca.gov/our_city/departments_and_divisions/community_development/planning_services/marketplace.

To pretend that the City Council, as the appeal hearing body, could somehow avoid access to those materials would require elaborate denial-of-access measures, including technological and cybersecurity restrictions, that are not realistic to implement or enforce.

Nor is it realistic to pretend that the appeal body is insulated from ongoing exposure to the project. Council members regularly meet with applicants, especially major repeat players such as Sunset Development, with City staff, and with members of the Planning Commission as part of City governance. Without extraordinary self-censorship and enforceable restrictions, discussions touching on pending approvals are bound to occur. The City should therefore stop implying that a City Council appeal operates in a vacuum or that the Council can realistically be treated as if it were presented with the matter without prior exposure to the project, the record, or the parties.

The process cadence also has a separate practical consequence under Senate Bill 330, the Housing Crisis Act of 2019.

San Ramon's own Housing in San Ramon page states that under Senate Bill 330, cities may hold only five public meetings for a proposed housing development, including meetings, workshops, and appeals. See:
https://www.sanramon.ca.gov/askcityhall/RHNA. The City's own public pages show the Orchards proceeding through first-, second-, and third-public-hearing stages, followed by a City Council appeal hearing. See:
https://www.sanramon.ca.gov/news/what_s_new/orchards_first_public_hearing, https://www.sanramon.ca.gov/news/what_s_new/the_orchards_second_public_hearing, https://www.sanramon.ca.gov/news/what_s_new/orchards_third_public_hearing, and https://www.sanramon.ca.gov/news/what_s_new/the_orchards_appeal_april_7_city_council_meeting. For more significant projects, that means the appeal lands on the fourth public meeting in the sequence. As a practical matter, the current process and meeting cadence compress the review path and can deny interested parties, including San Ramon constituents, what would otherwise be a fifth allowable public meeting and a separate deliberative opportunity on whether the City should grant the approvals. So, the current appeal structure is not only cost-prohibitive and poorly described; it also expedites project approval by collapsing what should be a fuller public deliberative sequence, and a fifth allowable meeting.

A later reduction in appeal fees does not retroactively cure the prior cost-prohibitive burden imposed on appellants during the period when the challenged approvals and appeals were actually proceeding.

Simply put, the potential cost of appeal should be funded as a deposit paid by the applicant or developer, refundable if the project is not appealed, rather than continuing to place the full upfront financial burden on public appellants.

K.The City's claim or implication that these fee changes move San Ramon toward full cost recovery or fiscal adequacy is misleading, and full cost recovery is not an ethical or equitable safe harbor.

The staff report states that the Finance Department will continue administering Master Fee Schedule updates aimed at recovering up to 100% of the cost of services provided. It also states that the revised fees reflect multiple factors, including the Consumer Price Index (CPI), the Construction Cost Index (CCI), actual labor rates, nexus study methodology, and Council direction.

That narrative is misleading.

A revised fee schedule and an updated nexus methodology do not demonstrate that the City has fully captured the actual cost of development or solved the broader fiscal problem of growth.

The City still has not shown:
a current cumulative fiscal analysis for the downtown and Bishop Ranch redevelopment; a current cumulative absorption analysis;
the extent to which the City's existing service base is still being backfilled by Measure N; the operating, maintenance, lifecycle replacement, and service burdens not recovered by the revised fees; or a credible explanation of how the City's long-term fiscal position improves under the present growth pattern.

Nothing in the current packet proves true fiscal adequacy.

And even if full cost recovery may be legally permissible in some circumstances, it is not an ethical or equitable safe harbor.

The American Planning Association (APA) Ethical Principles in Planning expressly state that they guide certified planners, other practicing planners, appointed and elected officials, and others who participate in planning, and they emphasize the public interest, meaningful participation, clear information, access to records, and fair dealing. Critically, they also require planning process participants to strive to expand choice and opportunity for all persons, recognizing a special responsibility to plan for the needs of disadvantaged groups and persons and to give citizens, including those who lack formal organization or influence, full, clear, and accurate information and a meaningful role in plan and program development: https://www.planning.org/ethics/ethicalprinciples/.

The American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP) Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct likewise makes equity explicit. It directs planning participants to recognize and work to mitigate the impacts of existing plans and procedures that result in patterns of discrimination, displacement, or environmental injustice, to promote an increase in the supply and quality of affordable housing and improved services and facilities with equal access for all residents, including people with disabilities, to deal fairly with all participants in the planning process, and to safeguard the public trust: https://www.planning.org/ethics/ethicscode/.

That matters here. Even if the Council strongly supports affordable housing — and it plainly does — equity does not mean maximizing housing production alone. A city cannot credibly claim to be advancing equity through affordable housing while simultaneously maintaining a fee-and-process framework that prices existing residents, neighborhood groups, and lessorganized community members out of meaningful participation in project review and appeals. Equity also means fair access to the process, fair distribution of burdens and benefits, meaningful participation for those without power or money, and protection against displacement, environmental injustice, and a decline in quality of life. A fee program that rhetorically supports affordable housing while still pricing residents out of appeals, still withholding a clear and codified process, and still underexplaining the infrastructure and service burdens that will later be shifted onto taxpayers is not equitable planning.

L.The transportation-fee inflation methodology remains warped, overly generic, and effectively prodeveloper.

The April 14 staff report states that 30 Public Works Traffic Impact Mitigation Fees were adjusted by the 2025 San Francisco Bay Area Construction Cost Index (CCI) of 0.6%, consistent with the methodology used by the Tri-Valley Transportation Council (TVTC). It also states that 424 fees were adjusted by 2.82% based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI).

That remains one of the most problematic methodological choices in the entire fee package.

A generic regional Engineering News-Record (ENR) San Francisco Bay Area Construction Cost Index (CCI) adjustment of 0.6% does not credibly reflect what it costs San Ramon to design, bid, build, maintain, and update local transportation improvements.

It is not enough for the City to say that this is what the Tri-Valley Transportation Council (TVTC) does.

The City should be using:
its own construction-contract history,
its own bid-tab experience,
its own consultant transportation cost estimates,
and other local data grounded in San Ramon's actual infrastructure cost experience, or, at minimum, a methodology more closely tied to the local infrastructure and pavement-management tools used in the Bay Area.

More realistic public-sector comparison points are readily available, and they demonstrate just how understated the current

0.6% adjustment is. In the official 2025 Annual Infrastructure Construction Cost Inflation Estimate prepared for the City and County of San Francisco, public-sector infrastructure materials reported that the ENR Building Cost Index (BCI) – San Francisco increased 23.2% in 2022, the ENR Construction Cost Index (CCI) – San Francisco increased

14.1% in 2022, and the TBD Consultants Bid Index for an indexed new construction project in San Francisco increased

17.2% in 2022. The same official report also shows the Bureau of Labor Statistics' New Construction Producer Price Index increasing by 18.9% in 2022 and by 11.6% in 2023. See: City and County of San Francisco 2025 Annual Infrastructure Construction Cost Inflation Estimate.

The Bay Area also already has more locally grounded infrastructure-management tools than a blunt annual escalator. The Metropolitan Transportation Commission Pavement Management Technical Assistance Program and StreetSaver® are specifically designed to help cities and counties understand local pavement conditions, budget needs, funding gaps, and cost-effective roadway management. See: Metropolitan Transportation Commission Pavement Management Technical Assistance Program and StreetSaver®. The point is not that the City must adopt StreetSaver as an inflation index. The point is that San Ramon has not explained why it continues to rely on low, generic transportation-fee escalators instead of using a methodology grounded in its own construction history, consultant costs, bid tabs, and local infrastructure experience — or at a minimum, a methodology more closely tied to public-sector infrastructure conditions and real construction pricing.

Absent that explanation, the current approach looks less like fiscal realism and more like a pro-developer preference for fee predictability and restrained annual increases.

M.In the context of the City Council's 2026 Goals and Objectives and current Norms, the handling of this item still falls well short of the City's own standards.

The attached 2026 City Council Goals and Objectives and January 2026 City Council Norms make this item even more problematic.

If the Council is serious about maintaining a secure financial base, it cannot approve a fee package that still lacks a cumulative fiscal context and still relies on questionable inflation methods.

If the Council is serious about providing cost-effective and responsive services to sustain quality of life, it cannot approve an appeal-fee structure that still burdens public access to review and a transportation-fee methodology that may understate real infrastructure costs.

If the Council is serious about enhancing engagement and communication, it cannot proceed on a record that still requires the public to reconstruct the story across multiple meetings, separate notices, attachments, and companion agenda items.

If the Council is serious about balancing land-use planning for housing, retail, jobs, and open space, it cannot ignore the connection among the fee schedule, Ordinance 537, the parkland and open-space fee framework, and the broader development trajectory already approved.

And if the Council is serious about its norms — Do What Is Best for the Community, Be Prepared, and Conduct Effective Meetings — then it must insist on a fuller record and a more candid explanation of what remains unresolved.

N.The Council should not approve this resolution unless it requires a fuller and unified record, expressly incorporates the Ordinance 537 record and related public comments, and requires meaningful reform of the appeal framework.

At a minimum, the Council should do the following before approving Resolution No. 2026-047:

1. Expressly acknowledge on the record that Ordinance 537 was approved separately, even though it was intrinsically linked to this fee schedule item.

2. Expressly incorporate the Ordinance 537 record and all related public comments by reference into the administrative record for this item.

3. Require a clear memorandum showing what costs remain unrecovered under the revised fee structure and how the revised Master Fee Schedule relates to the City's structural fiscal condition.

4. Identify on the record which statutory notice and disclosure provision governs each new fee added in the Fiscal Year 2026-27 Master Fee Schedule, including the Collection Agency Administration Fee and the Firearm Storage Fee, and if the City cannot make that showing, continue and re-notice the hearing using the correct statutory timeline.

5. Require a full explanation of every inflation index and automatic escalator used in the Master Fee Schedule, especially for transportation-related fees, including why those indices are more appropriate than San Ramon-specific contract-history-based calibration.

6. Require a full action-specific cost basis for the appeal fees.

7. Require a specific explanatory memorandum for the Collection Agency Administration Fee and the Firearm Storage Fee, including the trigger for each fee, the persons subject to each fee, the legal authority for each fee, whether the Firearm Storage Fee applies only to firearms already in police custody, whether it applies to evidence or safekeeping property, whether any retrieval or release fees are separate, and how the proposed fee relates, if at all, to any local firearms safe-storage enforcement framework.

8. If the City cannot establish proper statutory notice, disclosure, and legal support for the Collection Agency Administration Fee and the Firearm Storage Fee, remove or defer only those two fees and return them separately, rather than further delaying action on the appeal-fee revisions.

9. Require reform of the refund provision so that partial success and material modification are eligible for whole or partial refunds.

10. Require a plain-language explanation and codification of the entire appeal process.

11. Require the City to stop characterizing City Council appeals as genuinely de novo unless it can clearly explain how prior Planning Commission materials already posted on the City's website, ordinary project-related contacts, and the existing hearing cadence are prevented from shaping the appeal record; and require an appeal process that does not compress or effectively consume the remaining public meeting opportunities available under Senate Bill 330, the Housing Crisis Act of 2019.

12. Require impartiality safeguards so that appeal review is not simply another opportunity for the same staff position to be re-argued.

13. Require consideration of an applicant- or developer-funded appeal deposit or escrow for discretionary approvals, refundable if the project is not appealed, rather than continuing to place the entire upfront burden on public appellants.

Conclusion
The April 14, 2026 Master Fee Schedule packet is more developed than the March 24 continuance packet, but it still does not resolve the core problems.

The appeal fees are lower, but still too high.

The refund footnote exists but remains too narrow.

The fee descriptions remain thin.

The two newly added fees, especially the Firearm Storage Fee, also remain inadequately explained in the packet, further confirming that the current record is still not complete.

The appeal process remains unreformed.

It also is not credibly de novo in practice, and the current appeal cadence can compress what should be a fuller public deliberative sequence by effectively consuming one of the limited public meetings available under Senate Bill 330, leaving significant projects with only four public meetings on approvals rather than the allowable five.

Nothing in this comment should be construed as consenting to any further delay in resolving the appeal-fee issue; any defect relating to the two newly added fees should be addressed by severing or deferring those fees alone, not by extending the life of an appeal-fee framework that remained cost-prohibitive when the relevant approvals and appeals actually occurred.

The transportation-fee escalation methodology remains weak and overly generic.

The City still has not shown a cumulative fiscal picture.

And the City still has not candidly explained how these repeated methodological changes fit within its ongoing structural fiscal stress.

The separate approval of Ordinance 537 on March 24 did not eliminate the linkage between the two items. It only made the record more fragmented and the City's procedural choices more troubling.

The Council should not treat this as proof that the City has solved the problem.

It has not.

Respectfully submitted,
Brian C. Swanson, AICP
San Ramon Voter, Taxpayer, and Resident
On Fri, Apr 10, 2026 at 4:10 PM City of San Ramon <[email protected]> wrote:

The City Council meeting will begin at 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, April 14, 2026.

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City of San Ramon | 7000 Bollinger Canyon Road, San Ramon, CA 94583 | (925) 973-2500 | www.sanramon.ca.gov 2026 City Council Goals and Objectives
Goal #1: Maintain a Safe and Secure Environment
. Objective #1: lmplement a Police Dept Strategic Plan
. Objective #2'. Enhance technological capabilities to improve public safety efficiency . Objective #3: lncrease and lmprove public safety public engagement Goal #2: Maintain a Secure Financial Base
. Objective #1: Evaluate reserve policy requirement (360/0) and alternatives . Objective #2: Enhance financial forecasting
. Objective #3: Develop and lmplement a Parks & Community Services Cost Recovery/Sustainable Subsidy Policy
Goal#3: Provide Cost Effective and Responsive Services to Sustain Quality of Life
. Objective #1: Develop a City Council Code of Conduct/Rules & Procedures docu ment
. Objective#2: Elevate Risk Management program by providing both public and Council briefings on program performance
. Objective #3: Standardize how departments analyze and report service data, ensuring consistent metrics for evaluating program performance and resource needs
Goal#4: Build and Maintain Quality Facilities and lnfrastructure . Objective #1: lmplement Phases 1 &2 of Crow Canyon Garden Renovation . Objective #2: Develop a Forest Home Farms Renovation Plan . Objectlve #3: Approve and lmplement the Trails Master Plan Goal #5: Enhance Engagement and Communication with Residents and Business Community
. Objective #1: Refresh the City website (content and design) to improve user experience
. Objective #2: Conduct a community survey with national benchmarks to measure how resident satisfaction scores compare with other US cities . Objective #3: Complete a comprehensive assessment of the San Ramon economy to place local performance within the broader Tri-Valley and Bay Area region
Goal #5: Balance Land Use Planning for Housing, Retail, Jobs and Open Space . Objective #1: Work with stakeholders on new infill development opportunities wlthin the city core and existing commercial centers . Objective #2: Work with property owners/developers and permitting entities (internal and external agencies) to transition approved projects to construction phases
. Objective #3: Strengthen the ADU program by aligning standards with State law, updating permit-ready plans, and administering construction rebate incentives through the ADU Accelerator Program
San Ramon City Counci! Norms
January 2025
The following set of norms were first developed by City Council in April 2024 ata teambuilding workshop. The norms were reviewed and endorsed by Council in February 2025 at their annual goa l-setti ng workshop.
r Do What is best for the Community - Adopt a citywide perspective and make decisions and deliver results based on the needs and interest of the community at large. o Demonstrate Respect - Treat each other; staff, and the community with respect by acting with a high degree of professionalism and civility, and by focusing on policies and issues, not personalities, personal qualities, or "gotcha" questions and statements. o Engage Collaboratively - Work together, develop a sense of "team spirit," and keep lines of communication open by being approachable, responsive, and supportive of each other. o Listen Carefully - Actively listen to each otheq enabling Council colleagues to finish their thoughts without interrupting or jumping to conclusions and assuming and intent. o Be Prepared - Come to meetings prepared; do your "homework," read the staff reports, and ask staff questions before meetings when possible.
. Conduct Effective Meetings - Ensure meetings are conducted in a reasonable time frame; be concise with comments and questions, avoid long speeches, and be considerate of each other; the community, and staff's time.

AB 2561 Presentation:

Status of the City’s Vacancies and
Recruitment and Retention Efforts in
Calendar 2025
April 14, 2026
1 Item No. 9.1 AB 2561 Presentation
Vacancy Information - General
• Average % of Vacancies at the End of Each Month: 9.2% • Highest % of Vacancies at the End of a Month: 11.1%
• Lowest % of Vacancies at the End of a Month: 6.6%
2 CY 2025 Jan Feb March April May June July Aug Sept Oct Nov Dec # of Vacancies
Created
1 5 4 4 6 6 8 6 2 5 6 6
# of Vacancies
Filled
0 2 5 1 6 7 2 5 2 6 5 5
# of Remaining
Vacancies
19 22 21 24 24 23 29 30 30 29 30 31
# of Budgeted
FTEs
287.75 287.75 287.75 287.75 287.75 287.75 279.75 279.75 279.75 279.75 279.75 279.75 Vacancy Information – Bargaining Units
3 As of 12/31/2025 # of Vacancies # of Budgeted FTEs % of Vacancies SEIU, Local 1021 6 59 10.2%
SRPOA 4 63 6.3%
Unrepresented 21 150 14.0%
Recruitment Information - General
Total # of Vacancies Filled During Calendar Year 2025: 46 • Vacancies Filled by Existing Eligibility List/Ongoing Recruitment: 4 • Average # of Calendar Days to Fill Vacancies: 50
• Vacancies Filled by New External/Internal Recruitment: 29 • Average # of Calendar Days to Fill Vacancies: 154
• Vacancies Filled by New Internal Only Recruitment: 12 • Average # of Calendar Days to Fill Vacancies: 163
• Vacancies Filled by Appointment: 1
• Average # of Calendar Days to Fill Vacancies: 10
4 Retention Information - General
Total # of Vacancies Created During Calendar Year 2025: 59 • # of Vacancies Created by Newly Budgeted Positions: 9 • % of Vacancies Resulting From Staffing Growth: 15%
• # of Vacancies Created by Internal Promotion: 28
• # of Vacancies Created by Internal Transfer: 0
• % of Vacancies Resulting From Internal Opportunity: 47% • # of Vacancies Created by Retirement: 13
• # of Vacancies Created by Involuntary Separation: 2
• % of Vacancies Resulting From Attrition: 25%
• # of Vacancies Created by Voluntary Separation: 7
• % of Vacancies Resulting From Turnover: 12%
Annual Staffing Turnover Rate: 2.5%
5 Hiring Issues - General
• The City continuously reviews applicable policies, procedures, and recruitment activities to identify any potential obstacles in the City’s hiring process. • While the City contends with the same recruitment issues as other public agencies (standardized recruitment practices, lengthy background checks, etc.), we have not identified any other significant hurdles to recruitment, as evidenced by our vacancy rates.
6 Questions?
7 City Council
Budget Workshop
FY 2026-27

REVENUE OVERVIEW
APRIL 14, 2026
1 City of San Ramon
Item No. 9.2 Budget Workshop
Presentation

REPORT GOALS
▪ Emphasize foundation for the path to fiscal sustainability ▪ Outline Major Revenue components
▪ Introduce assumptions for Major Revenue sources
▪ Receive feedback from the City Council
▪ What to expect beyond FY 2026-27
2 General Fund
▪ Property Tax: 3% increase, $1.6M
▪ Sales tax
▪ Bradley-Burns: 6.4% increase, $950K
▪ Measure N: 9.6% reduction, $1.3M
▪ Franchise Fees: ~30% reduction, $1.8M
◦ NOTE: Typo in the staff report, page 3, paragraph 3, says 3%. ▪ Charges for Service: 2.8% increase, $723 K
▪ Intergovernmental revenue: Reduction $523 K
▪ TOTAL Revenue growth from FY 2025-26: 0.45%, $370K
3 OVERVIEW – GENERAL FUND REVENE
4 REVENUE BY SOURCE - GENERAL FUND
2025/26

REVISED
2025/26

PROJECTED
ACTUAL
2026/27

PRELIMINARY

PRELIMINARY
Budget Change -
Thousands $
Property Tax $ 26,311,354 $ 27,101,000 $ 27,915,949 $ 1,605 Sales & Use Tax 13,179,800 13,230,758 14,125,622 946
Transaction and Use tax - Measure N 14,841,584 13,541,395 13,455,532 (1,386) Property Transfer Tax 638,282 693,000 638,282 -
Transient Occupancy Tax (TOT) 2,441,856 2,508,000 2,596,366 155 Franchise Fees 6,244,990 5,506,000 4,493,072 (1,752)
Licenses & Permits* 3,621,223 4,670,000 4,043,662 422
Charges for Services 8,648,612 8,640,000 9,372,610 724
Fines & Forfeitures* 200,000 144,000 190,000 (10)
Investment Income 418,005 465,000 492,160 74
Intergovernmental 2,326,496 1,600,000 1,803,435 (523)
Miscellaneous Revenue* 3,907,227 3,907,000 4,021,879 115 Transfers In 5,254,275 5,254,275 5,254,275 -
TOTAL $ 88,033,704 $ 87,260,428 $ 88,402,844 $ 370
OVERVIEW – GENERAL FUND REVENE
5 Dougherty Valley County Service Area
(DV CSA)
▪ Funded through:
▪ County Special Assessments: 2.48% growth
▪ 1% Ad Valorem Property Tax: 4% growth
◦ NOTE: Assumptions are based on the actual revenue received, not the FY 2025-26 Budget- per consultants, Francisco and Associates. ▪ TOTAL Revenue growth from FY 2025-26: 1.3%, $309K
▪ Fund is subsidized by the General Fund to support current service level: 21.8% increase, $905K
6 OTHER MAJOR FUNDS
7 ▪ Gas Tax: 4.79% increase, $228K
▪ Development Impact Fee Funds: Revenue fluctuates based on the development activity
▪ Community Facility District funds: Funded through Special assessments to support agreed upon service level
▪ Internal Service Funds: Support ongoing needs for IT
replacement, Healthcare, and Insurance. Funded through
Charges to Departments
TOTAL Revenue Composition: $156.5M
8 General Fund, 53.13%
DV - Dougherty Valley, 15.08%
ISF, 12.32%
DIF, 5.51%
Gas Tax, 3.13%
LLAD - Zones, 2.80%
Special Operating - PW, 2.43%
Debt, 2.30% GHAD, 2.09%
CIP, 0.44%
CFD, 0.31%
Special Operating - Planning,

0.27%
Other,

0.14% Measure J - Streets Maintenance,

0.04%
Revenue Composition By Fund

CONCLUSIONS
9 ▪ Preliminary General Fund revenue growth of 0.45%
is below the 4% average historical rate
▪ Revenue projections will be adjusted as additional
information becomes available
▪ Trends confirm that the City has little decisionmaking control over factors on the revenue side of the budget as so much of it is driven by the economy
and consumer behavior

NEXT STEPS
▪ Staff will incorporate feedback from City
Council on tonight’s presentation
✓ Additional workshop if necessary
▪ Next Budget Workshop Scheduled for April
28, 2026
✓ Expense budget workshop, to include
the Capital Improvement Program
10

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