Good morning and welcome to the Finance and Management Committee meeting of Tuesday, May
26, 2026, the time is now 9.30 a.m. and this meeting may come to order.
Before taking roll, I will provide instructions on how to submit speaker cards for items on
this agenda.
If you're here with us in chamber and would like to submit a speaker card, please fill
one out and turn one into myself or a clerk representative, no later than 10 minutes after
the start of this meeting or before the item is read into record, whichever occurs first.
to speak via zoom is now due 24 hours prior to the start of this meeting time.
This meeting came to order at 930 a.m. and speaker cards will no longer be accepted 10
minutes after making that time 940 a.m. we'll now proceed with taking roll council members
brown present under here Wong Wong is walking through the door councilmember Wong for attended
Present thank you
And chair Ramachandran present. Thank you. We have four members present chair before we begin. Do you have any announcements at this time?
No, we're gonna keep two minutes per speaker, but if you
Are with a group of people if you're able to
jointly make comments
That is that is an available option
Thank you starting off with item one approval of the draft minutes from the committee meeting of May 12
And we have no speakers on this item
We just need a motion
That was a motion made by councilmember Brown seconded by councilmember Unger to approve the draft minutes from the committee meeting of May 12
2026 on roll council members Brown. I
Unger I long I and chair Ramachandran. I thank you item one passes with four eyes
Reading in item number two determination of schedule about standing committee items and we have no speakers on this item anything from staff
Nothing at this time. Thank you. All right. I'll entertain a motion
Move the pending list second. Thank you
That's a motion made by councilmember Brown second by councilmember Unger to accept the determination of schedule about standing committee items as is
Unrolled council members Brown. I under I long
I and share Ramachandran. Thank you item number
Two regarding the determination of schedule about standing committee items passes as is now reading in item number three
through to get back to you.
Receive an informational report on fiscal year 2025-26,
third quarter revenues and exponentials,
results and year-end estimates for the general purpose fund
and select funds.
And we have a number of speakers on this item.
Thank you.
Please go ahead.
Good morning, Chair, members of the committee,
Brad Johnson, Director of Finance.
Before you use a report on our third quarter revenue
expenditure report, I'd ask K-Top to get the presentation going.
A report, so this is with information through the beginning of April of the current fiscal
year.
As you are all aware, the revenue expenditure reports provide information on the city's
expenditures year to date in the General Purpose Fund and many other funds.
Today we're going to give you a background on the report, go over some key results for
the General Purpose Fund, including revenues, expenditures, and fund balance, and provide
some high level information, as usual, on our ongoing pressures and opportunities.
This report is provided, again, per your consolidated fiscal policy.
It presents and outlines the items required by that policy, particularly the performance
of the General Purpose Fund, in order to perform ongoing monitoring for the City's fiscal health
and ensure transparency.
Let's not bury the lead.
The city's general purpose fund is expected to end the end of the fiscal year at a healthy
level.
This is roughly $32.32 million at the end of 26-27 as projected.
This is an increase of $15.45 million from the year in fund balance of $16 million roughly
at the end of last fiscal year.
That fund balance is equal to roughly 4% of the general purpose fund's expenditures.
walking you through this high level chart and we don't want to bury the lead
here we began the year at an audited fund balance exclusive of all carry
forward of 87 million dollars we're expecting an operating deficit of 53
million dollars which is primarily due to the use of fund balance from items
carried forth from the prior year the net when we remove restricted settlement
revenue is again a 32 million dollar end-of-the-year balance so that is not a
surplus but an end-year balance of 32 million dollars. Again walking through at
a high level the city's adopted budget for the general purpose fund was 79
791 million dollars being in the year. It grew via the adjusted budget to 847
million dollars again this is primarily due to use of fund balance to support
carry port expenditures. You can see our actuals year-to-date and you can see our
projected year in numbers and again you can see what that operating balance
looks like at the end of the year again 55 million dollars of the reason why
you see the difference between these two numbers is the inclusion of carry
forwards which draw from fund balance and so that is one of the reasons why
again you see that operating shortfall I just want to use my discretion can you
clarify these numbers again absolutely using ice and demand speaking a little
The city has adopted budget which was adopted by the council at the beginning of the current
fiscal year.
That adopted budget is adjusted by council actions and carry forward actions that happen
after the end of the fiscal year.
In this case it's the carry forward of roughly 55 million dollars, which are supported by
use of fund balance on the general purpose fund.
So to define what carry forward means, when expenditures for council prove items in the
prior year are not expended, those items are moved forward potentially into the coming
fiscal year and the resource that funds them are that prior year's revenues.
So again, you have your adopted budget, you have your adjusted budget, and then you see
these variants is from that. The structural imbalance or the deficit
within the operating year is, again, the difference between the revenues and
expenditure actuals over the current year, but that includes use of fund
balance. So to the extent that Cary Fords are not included, you would see a
different operating picture, which is why, again, going back to the prior slide, we
We began with, ooh, it's gotten a little bit louder.
Sorry, our clicker's not working here again.
There we go, going back to the prior slide,
we're noting again that the end year number
for the Journal Purpose Fund is expected to be $32 million
over at the end of the fiscal year in the black.
To go through the details of our revenue,
I'm gonna hand it off to Jose Segura
from our revenue bureau to talk through our details.
Good morning, through the chair,
with the finance department.
Third quarter projections expect that fiscal year 2025-26 will lend approximately 59.9
million or 7.1% below budget.
However, as Director Johnson just alluded to, about 55.3 million of that variance is
attributable to the planned use of fund balance to support prior year carry-forwards.
When we exclude that planned use of fund balance, projected general purpose fund revenues are
estimates to come in approximately four million below budget or about one half
of one percent overall. The shortfall is primarily concentrated in three major
revenue categories property tax, sales tax, and utility consumption tax which we
will review in the next slides. Starting with property tax, coming into fiscal
year 2025-26, assessed valuations in the city had been growing at an average
the current budget we already
anticipated a more moderate
growth of approximately 4%
reflecting slowing market
conditions. However actual a
size valuation growth for fiscal
year twenty twenty five twenty
six came in at just zero point
eight percent. Which represents
the third lowest annual growth
rate in the past thirty years
for the city. With the only two
years immediately the growth of
the only two years immediately following the 2008 recession,
recording lower growth.
This low down is primarily driven
by proposition eight reductions,
which are concentrated mainly
in the commercial property sector.
Prop eight allows temporary reductions in assessed values
when market values fall below previously assessed valuations.
Turning to utility consumption tax,
or the past decade or so,
Electrical utility rates basically doubled which contributed to strong year-over-year growth in utility consumption tax revenues for the city over that time
however, as shown in the graph on the screen utility rates have now stabilized and
Through the third quarter utility consumption tax revenues were trending essentially flat compared to the same period last fiscal year
And revenues are now projected to finish the year approximately at the same level as fiscal year 2425
rather than continuing the growth trend that had been anticipated in the adopted budget.
Sales tax
collections are administered by the state and reporting lags behind other revenue categories.
At this point, detailed reporting is available through the second quarter of fiscal year 2025-26.
And through the second quarter, Oakland sales tax receipts were on average
approximately three point five percent below fiscal year twenty twenty four twenty five levels over that same period
It's important to note that sales tax now includes revenues from the new measure a sales tax
which
Went into effect on October 1st at the start of the second quarter of this fiscal year
And now I will hand it off to the budget team who will present the expenditure portion
Daniel mariano budget analyst for the general purpose fund for expenditures
they are currently projected to end the year 6.74 million dollars under the adjusted budget
or just about under one percent.
Comparing just the second quarter, this is an improvement of about one and a half percent
or 11.6 million dollars.
A more detailed breakdown of these figures are shown by department over the next two
slides.
The majority of departments are projected to end the fiscal year under budget with most
of them having spent three quarters or less of their budget through Q3 as shown on the
status bar of the far right.
There are a handful of departments on both slides that are shown projected to overspend.
And as we explained previously in the Q2 as well, the reason for this is due to the one
time adjustments that were due to the bonuses that were paid out earlier this year.
Without these adjustments that are currently unbudgeted, all departments in the general
purpose fund would have been projected to come in under budget.
I will now pass it back to Director Johnson to finish off the rest of the presentation.
Thank you, Daniel.
Again, returning to our to our year-end fund balance to reiterate this point, at the beginning
of the year, without including carry-a-fords, you began the year with $87 million in the
Bank and the General Purpose Fund.
That number, including carry-a-fords, was only $16 million.
However, when we now include carry-a-fords within your budget, within the current years,
and we project those out, we're showing an operating deficit of $53 million.
And once we reduce restricted legal settlement revenue,
we expect your year-end available balance
at the end of the fiscal year to be $32.2 million,
which is a slight and modest improvement
over last fiscal year.
I should note that we're getting to this point.
It was difficult over the course of 24-25.
The city adopted many, many policies
to bring that year's budget in alignment.
And as we continue in our efforts to control expenditures,
We're seeing slight improvements again
in that general purpose fund in your balance.
As both Jose and Daniel noted,
we're seeing both revenues and expenditures
coming in under budget in the general purpose fund.
Again, your revenues are under budget
primarily due to your property tax numbers,
your UCT numbers, and your sales tax numbers,
and we're seeing reductions, sorry,
underspending in just about every single
general purpose fund department compared to its budget.
The city is in compliance with its mandated reserve policies,
including its emergency reserve and our Omer's Reserve.
So you're seeing full compliance with those policies
per our consolidated fiscal policy.
The city does not have any resources included
in its rainy day or vital services stabilization fund.
Noting some other key funds,
the city is suspecting underspending in its measure HH
and self-insurance liability fund this year.
That latter one is primarily due
to lower settlement activity.
It's expecting slight overspending
in its affordable housing trust fund,
slight overspending in its measure BB related funds,
slight underspending in its gas tax fund,
underspending in Parks Measure Q primarily due
to staffing concerns,
underspending in LAD equipment and facilities.
And again, these are all factored into your year in estimates.
As we look forward, the city continues to face
ongoing financial pressure in several areas.
These are things that I've mentioned to you in the past,
but I'll mention to you again,
Our increasing cost for PERS, health, health care,
and insurance.
Uncertainty regarding what the federal government
may do at any point in time.
The measure E elements that are on the June ballot.
Restoring our ballot measure MOEs,
and if we, and MOE in this case stands
for maintenance of effort as we may recall,
we've added a report to this committee back in February
noting our process for getting back into compliance
with those maintenance of effort requirements.
Key needs as we're noting in our budget presentations
regarding equipment and facilities,
including replacing vehicles technology.
And there are a number of funds which remain negative,
which must be resolved eventually.
The city does have opportunities to mitigate these impacts.
Again, to build on our improved collection practices
regarding revenue performance.
We've done a lot more in terms of collecting business tax,
maintaining discipline and spending.
As you know, every department,
including our two largest departments being police and fire,
are expected to come in under budget
in the current fiscal year.
So maintaining that fiscal discipline is critical.
Having a positive beginning position against starting behind the ball is really really difficult when one is dealing with ending
Trying to end in a positive place and again
We successfully access the bond market this past fiscal year
And we need to continue to do that as being able to invest in capital improvement does lower maintenance requirements in the long run
Key takeaways for our any and accepts. There's a projected positive positive ending fund balance of 32 million dollars again
That's less than 1% of our general purpose fund expenditures, but it is a positive number that we want to end with
We are projected to end with an operating deficit. That's revenues less expenditures of
53 million dollars
Again, this is primarily due to 55 million dollars in carry forward being supported by prior year revenues
with a balanced
Mid-cycle proposed budget released the city will continue to work on correcting our structural balances over the long term to bring revenues on an
ongoing basis in line with expenditures and the city continue must continue to
exercise ongoing fiscal prudence to ensure our long-term fiscal health with
that we'll take any questions you may have thank you I will start again with
clarifying those numbers and pretty sure understand been just of clarity we have
three numbers that showed that what we're ending the year at there is 53
million which you said is the operating deficit but there's also the 6.3 million
figure and then there's the positive ending fund balance so how do we have a
negative operating deficit but a positive ending balance. Absolutely. What is this
6.3 in between which I feel like is the important number. Absolutely. So the
easiest way to think about this is with your own bank account. When you have, let's
say you ended the last month with a positive balance
in your account, but you had planned to do expenditures
in the next period.
You had already planned, you'd booked airfare,
but you hadn't booked your hotel yet to go on a vacation.
You're committed to doing something,
and so you need to carry forward the obligation
for that next period of expenditures.
And so when you look at that next month,
you'll see that you spent more out of your account
than you took it in terms of your salary.
And that's that negative $55 million operating deficit.
Again, you're drawing on a planned expenditure
from the prior year.
So did you actually have an operating deficit
in that next month period?
Absolutely you did.
Income minus expenditures is a negative number.
However, because you plan that,
what you actually care about in the long run is,
do you have a healthy balance in your account?
And that healthy balance in your account
is the $32 million, right?
So you actually spent a little bit less on that hotel
that you plan to do.
And so you actually grew at the end of the prior month
the balance where you thought you'd be.
And so you can both have in a period an operating deficit
and be moving toward a fiscally healthy position.
So you're seeing both of those things
happen simultaneously.
And as the chair mentioned,
you also care about your performance
based on what you expected.
Did you take in as much in terms of your current
your period as you thought compared to what you allowed
yourself to budget and what you thought you would do?
And in the current case, the city is both
under collecting on its revenue,
mostly do it again, property tax, sales tax, and UCT,
but it's also under spending its budget.
So this might imagine if you're a worker that works for tips,
your tipped wages might be a little bit lower
than what you thought you were working on,
but you also manage to economize a little bit
on your grocery bill.
And the net of those is still toward the positive
in terms of your imbalance.
And so this is a little bit more of a complicated
and mixed story than sort of the clear space
where you were in last year or a clearly positive space
you might see growing across the board.
The city is growing its year in bank account number,
which if you track year to year to year,
that's the number you actually care about.
You need that number always to be positive
and ideally to be growing very slightly.
But we do have this ongoing fiscal pressure
of within the current period,
we are spending more than we had revenue coming in,
but that again was due to prior year planned expenditures
and was anticipated and expected.
So this is not aberrant.
we should not be surprised by this.
And again, if you compare your,
compared to your budgetary projections,
both your revenues and expenditures are both coming in under
with expenditures coming in a little bit more under
than your revenues.
And the 6.3 million, what is that?
If I remember correctly, your 6.3 should be
your revenue number compared to budget.
If I remember correctly, your 6.3 would be your
under spending on revenues if I'm not
if I'm catching your drift council, sorry, Chair.
If you're talking about the percentage
that would be your,
the under spending as a ratio of your budget.
So again, it's the $53 million as a comparison
of the total number, right?
So if I look at that $53 million on a percentage basis,
we spent about $6.3 million in the period
more than we expected.
But again, that is primarily due
to the inclusion of that carry forward balance
and the drawing down of that.
So again, positive performance on the year and number,
more spending in the period than revenues,
however, that was planned.
And when you look at your, compared to your budget,
you're seeing slight underperformance on both ends.
Thank you.
Colleagues, Councillor Wong.
Hi, yes, thank you.
Always helpful to get these.
I have a couple of questions.
So just a first clarifying question
on the property tax slide, I think this is slide eight.
So we know that we have,
basically we're going to be,
we're $10 million under the projection.
Can you really break out like that graph
since, just to understand,
because I think I want to really understand
what is driving the reduction in property values
and is it mostly the downtown area?
Like what is happening?
Absolutely, so there's this,
and if Kitop would pull up the presentation again,
I'd happily put up that slide
so that you can see what we're all referring to.
And what is this parcel ad drops net change
if you could explain that particular metric?
Absolutely, so this is the slide you're referring to.
So when we look at the change in our assessed valuation
of property year to year,
it is governed under the state constitution
by Proposition 13.
a property that in normal circumstances
where you have an inflation rate greater than 2%,
which is traditionally true in California,
normally every property will grow by a 2% valuation.
That's normally your baseline.
However, in spaces where the assessor thinks,
where there is a property that changes hands,
either do a market sale, it resets at that time span
to the new market value of whatever the sale is.
In time spans where the assessors of each of the counties
across California note that property values
are assessed to be lower than the market rate
where they were required for,
there's this thing called a Prop 8 reduction,
which allows the assessor to reset properties,
not just below the 2% gain amount,
but to what they think the estimated market value
would be based on comparables,
and taxpayers apply for these.
These Prop 8 reassessments for the city of Oakland
are primarily happening with multifamily properties,
both apartments and condominiums.
So multifamily is captured in commercial actually,
not residential, just to be clear or?
It would be, you know, it would be residential.
Residential, okay.
But if you're asking what's driving it,
it's multifamily residential.
Okay.
And heavily commercial in our downtown corridor.
Those are the two things
that are driving those reassessments.
Okay.
So to sort of answer your question,
the reassessments again of Prop 8
in the downtown corridor due to office vacancies
is a huge component of this,
but we're also seeing a lot of weakening primarily
in our multifamily residential market.
A lot of that is condominium actual properties.
There's a lot of information around condominium sales
in Oakland being down.
So it's that multifamily condo space.
It's really a space where we're seeing weakening.
Related to your single family market,
that continues to hold relatively steady.
So this is primarily multifamily, residential,
and again, commercial.
Okay, great.
My other question is, can we get written justifications
going forward from these reports
on why certain departments went over budget
and why also the budget had to come from the general fund?
For example, I noticed that IT
went over budget significantly,
but we are working with, in my opinion,
dinosaur age technology here in the city of Oakland.
So maybe there are legitimate reasons
that they went over budget,
but I would just want to see why it is,
and for any department, I'm not picking on IT,
but any department when they go over,
I'd like to see the reason why.
So we normally would provide, per your CFP,
we provide a breakdown if, at the Q2 or Q3,
we have an over 1% spend over budget.
You'll get some variance compared to budget
almost in a year, but the reason why you see overspending
in all of these departments has to do
with the year in bonus.
So let me explain that detail.
When the council adopted its budget adopted a balanced budget across all of its funds and there are a number of departments that don't have funding
primarily in your general purpose fund
however, we adopted labor agreements with our non sworn unions that contributed a
$3,000 one-time bonus and that was predicate and that was based on revenue that was received in the general purpose fund
We did not rebudget those departments for receipt of that bonus
So while we agreed to labor agreements that included it you never had a budget reopen that provided
budgetary resources to all of those departments
to include that bonus and so they will
spend that money because their employees would receive it and they're going to spend it from the general purpose fund because that's where the
Revenue supporting it was received even if they didn't have a budget from you to get it and so these smaller departments where you see
that happening, this overage is primarily due to the artifact of that one-time bonus.
This is not within these departments' ability to control, and it's kind of an aberrant thing
happening this year, and that's why you see it in places like IT, which is primarily not
in the journal purpose fund.
It's in an internal service fund, several internal service funds, if that makes sense.
Yes, it does.
Okay.
Thanks.
And then a question for the chair, actually.
Do we get a similar report for non-general fund revenues and expenditures through this
committee or if not can we get some version of that this is that same report
we provide a more detailed report in your attachment a that provides all the
detail the related to expenditures and projections for all those if you read
through the attachment a you'll find projections for every single one of the
city's budgeted funds it's in the it's in the back end of it yep thank you and
I'm looking at attachment a now there is there's quite a lot of detail fund my
and the Councilmember Brown-Dinancker.
Excellent.
Well, thank you so much for the detailed report, as always.
Just a couple questions.
I feel like you slightly answered my question
that Councilmember Wong had around just the overspending
from various departments.
For example, I was looking at Oakland Public Works,
and I guess I was assuming that maybe it had to do
with some of the illegal dumping surges,
and maybe that contributed to the overspending,
but I think from your response
across all of the departments,
it has to do with the one-time expenditure there.
Okay, and then my other question was,
what is our plan to come into alignment
with the overspending around Measure BB funds?
Absolutely, so that overspending,
we will be trying to address through your budget process.
I should note it's that projected overspending
may or may not be realized within the current fiscal year.
I would describe it more of as overcommitment of resources.
You have a lot of capital projects allocated to BB.
The same is true with your affordable housing trust fund.
We may not expense all of those within the current period.
And so as we're going forward to monitor,
we want to make sure that our fund balance
has moved toward health in terms of our year and number.
I don't expect, again, a fully drawn-on fund balance.
I expect it to be over obligated at the end of the year,
which is really what you're seeing here.
Thank you for the report.
So last year's contract negotiations
with the non-sworn folks had two components.
There was a one-time non-pensionable, non-persable bonus,
and then there was a trigger component
if certain milestones were met
that that a raise of a certain level would be triggered.
My understanding is that with this report we know where that stands. I've seen a lot of
reporting out there, I should say, faux reporting saying that the raises have already been awarded
that they will already eat up some portion of measure E should it pass. Did those raises get
triggered? Thank you, Councilmember Munger. No, they did not. The information regarding that
That particular contract version is noted in detail
on page five of your report.
So I actually extracted all of your contract language.
So should you want to read it?
The way that contract was negotiated,
revenues above the adopted budget,
and I should say that's the adopted budget,
not the adjusted number,
and there's a table below breaking that down,
less property sales, settlements, and insurance proceeds.
For every dollar above that, $150,000 above that,
there would be an additional ongoing COLA awarded
to your non-sworn units.
Right now we are projecting that total number to be negative
and so the COLA awarded would be zero.
There is the opportunity and there's the possibility
that we will end up seeing a COLA
because there's two time periods
in which it could be realized.
The first is, but I should say both of those periods
are based on the current fiscal year.
they're not based on next year or the year after,
they're based on the current year.
The first opportunity was again here at the Q3
based on our projections.
And those COLAs were they to be awarded,
would have been awarded at the end of May.
The next opportunity is at the end of the closing
of the current fiscal year.
And so should we between now and then
find that either our projections off
or that we receive unanticipated revenue
in one of the eligible categories
at the end of the fiscal year,
we would see colas triggered in January
at the beginning of the next calendar year
for that same period.
So we're not seeing it based on the Q3.
I should note to everyone, last fiscal year,
we did receive a single RETT transaction of $26 million.
I should note that if we got the same level of transaction,
we would go from no cola to a full cola,
that same level of variance.
And again, that was an unanticipated transaction
at the end of the year.
Should we have that same kind of occurrence,
you could see a swing on that basis
based on our projections, but we're not anticipating it
at this time and we wouldn't know if there's something
large like that that would occur.
So again, there is no, it's all based
on the current fiscal year.
I'll note specifically related to Measure E
because I knew that is a point of confusion
that we're trying to clarify as we got in the budget.
Measure E is both not a general purpose fund revenue.
It would be in a special fund,
nor is it in the current fiscal year.
So it lacks, it is neither the time period,
nor the right fund source that would trigger a COLA
per the civilian MOUs.
So it has neither of those characteristics.
So these raises were always conditional
and those conditions have not yet been met.
So the chatter that there was a large raise last year
is false.
There was civilian employees received no ongoing wage
increase last fiscal year.
Okay, and going forward, there is a separate,
completely separate negotiation process ongoing,
which does not relate to the previous one.
Yes, there is ongoing negotiations
that are being held at the table
with all six of the city's bargaining units currently.
Okay, thank you.
Okay, we can move to public comment.
Calling in the names that signed up to speak
on item number three in no particular order,
you can come up to the podium.
If you do have someone ceding their time to you,
please let me know so I can adjust the timing
and the person ceding their time to you must be present
to acknowledge that they are ceding their time.
David Vaughtwright, Kevin Dally, Chase Fowler,
Cody Meshburger, Heidi Giancola, Michael Ford,
Andrea Ramirez, Ruth Mesa, Noelle Ponduchek,
Rain Robochaud, Elliott Goodrich,
Sean, Dr. Sean Jones and Gene Tran.
Please state your name before beginning.
Morning, my name is Chase Fowler,
Cody Meshburger is ceding his time to me.
Okay, give me one moment to adjust your time.
Is Cody present?
Thank you.
Okay, you can go ahead and begin.
You'll get three minutes.
All right, thank you.
My name's Chase Fowler,
and I'm a proud member of IPT, Vocal 21.
My colleagues and I love working for the city of Oakland.
We do what we do because we are lucky enough
have the opportunity to make Oaklanders lives better in meaningful and tangible ways every
single day.
But the administration's actions consistently demonstrate that its priority is not providing
services for Oaklanders.
Despite inflation rising to nearly 4% over the last year, today the city administration
confirmed that they will not be providing a cost of living adjustment to its civilian
workers.
It is getting more and more and more expensive to live in Oakland every year and yet by failing
to pay its workers fair wages, the city administration has demonstrated that providing basic services
for Oaklanders is not a priority.
The last time the city did a wide-ranging salary survey was nearly a decade ago, back
in 2017.
If you can't pay your workers a fair living wage, you'll continue to lose workers, and
the workers that you do have will be forced to move out of Oakland.
The administration preaches fiscal responsibility as an excuse for not paying its workers fair
wages. But OPD overtime spending remains as high as ever. Despite making noises about
improved overtime controls, overtime and spending is actually projected to increase
from last year, $17 million over their overtime budget. We're told there's not enough officers
on the street, and yet crime has continued to go down anyways. We're told there's not
enough officers on the streets and yet it is our bargaining unit that has a 25% vacancy
rate in hundreds of vacant positions.
We're told there's not enough officers on the streets, and yet City Administration can't
take basic steps toward civilianizing desk jobs that cops are doing.
And despite the City Auditor making clear, identifiable, and reasonable recommendations
on changes to OPOA's contract, the City Administration has given no indication that they plan on prioritizing
these needed changes.
It is up to City Council to hold the Administration to account for these things.
Make the HR department report out on the vacancy rate every month.
Make administration give monthly status reports on the civilianization.
Direct city administration to implement the city auditor's recommendations.
Direct city administration to do a salary survey so you actually know what your workers
are getting paid.
Fight in action with transparency and accountability.
Those are your strongest and most powerful tools.
Thanks for your time.
Good morning council members.
My name is Noelle.
I'm a local 21 member.
I'm here because Oakland residents deserve a city workforce that is fully staffed and
fully able to deliver safe and reliable public services and that depends on providing fair
compensation for workers and reigning in OPD spending.
Right now, like Chase said, our unit, Local 21, has a 25% vacancy rate, meaning nearly
one in four positions is unfilled.
Residents experience those consequences through delayed projects, slower response times, reduced
access to critical city services. In transportation, where I work, these staffing shortages directly
affect public safety. When departments are understaffed, it becomes harder to move safety
projects forward quickly and respond to community concerns, makes it harder to coordinate improvements
and maintain the work needed to make Oakland Street safer for everyone.
The rising cost of living in the Bay Area makes it harder for public employees to afford
to stay in Oakland and without cost of living adjustments, vacancies, and turnover will
just continue to grow and as was mentioned, we did not receive a COLA in this last contract.
This instability impacts the city's ability to retain experienced staff who understand
Oakland's infrastructure, communities, and safety needs and it makes it a difficult choice
for staff to stay.
The city should continue to look for long term structural savings starting with the
department with the greatest cost to the general fund, OPD, which is budgeted for
43% of general fund funding spending more than all other non-fire
departments combined. We need to be looking at implementing some of these
fiscally responsible measures like civilianizing police department
positions. Cost of living adjustments are not just about workers, they're about
protecting residents access to safe streets and functioning city services. If
we want Oakland residents to receive the level of service and safety they
deserve the city must be able to recruit and retain the workforce needed
to provide it thank you for your time good morning
Elliot Goodrich and Rain Robichaud is seeding her time to me sorry Elliot who
was seeding their time to you Rain Robichaud okay perfect thank you give me
one moment to adjust your time you can go ahead and begin good morning
Elliot Goodrich transportation planning planner in the paving program at Oak
Oakland resident. Today's presentation painted a picture of a budget that is
plagued by persistent problems. Every non police and fire department under
budget. This is not good news. The anti-measure e flyers I've been getting
indicate that Oaklanders are frustrated that they are not receiving the services
that they pay for. I don't blame them. I also see persistent problems with the
city's lack of spending on core services. These problems are various but
let's look at which persistent problems do have immediate solutions. Well the
city auditor's report to you all on April 14th detailed the status of 300
recommendations the office has made since 2014. Only 19 of those
recommendations are labeled as not implemented and of these over a quarter
are from 2019 related to police overspending. These are persistent
structural problems with the OPOA MOU. No other open recommendation is older
than 2024 and no open recommendations pertain to issues with any of the
civilian MOUs. All of these recommendations say that the city
administration could should consider this recommendation during its
upcoming labor negotiation. That negotiation is happening now and the
target date listed in the auditor's report is right now. We have received no
indication whether or not the administration is considering these
recommendations, but you as counsel do have the power to ensure that these
persistent budget problems are solved. It is your job to certify that the
negotiations were undertaken in good faith and in the best interests of the
city when you approve the final contract. Please start thinking about what you
about the gravity of this duty and what you would do if a contract is presented
to you that does not address these persistent problems that have been
lingering for seven years now. Thank you. Hi my name is Jean Tran and Dr. Sean
Jones has offered to cede his time to me. Hello I my name is Jean Tran I come to
you as part of local 21 but also today as an Oakland City resident and I know
we're looking at these numbers in this report and we saw that property tax is
down 3% and what we need to notice is that that estimated revenue is almost
two and a half times more than the next category which is business tax licenses
and it's four times more than the next one down,
which is sales tax.
So our property taxes being down is a problem
and it affects our revenue and it affects our budget.
And a lot of that I think has to do
with our failing infrastructure.
Like our city, in order to attract new residents,
in order to attract new businesses,
and in order to attract retail and spending in our city,
we wanna have a city that people want to come to.
And when our infrastructure is failing,
and you can look around and like,
we are getting emergency sinkhole repairs,
we're getting all sorts of pop holes,
like we have not invested in our infrastructure in years,
because we keep putting it off and it is now coming due.
And this can be our inflection point
where we can take this money, take this budget,
reallocate it, and I know you guys have a very difficult job.
There's always the give and the take
of what do you spend on.
do you try to do the thing that makes us feel better now,
get that instant gratitude now,
or are we going to invest in some long-term gains
that will make a difference?
Because that's a lot of what we're looking at,
is that a lot of this overtime spending
is very reactionary.
And we need to take a moment to look at moving
toward the future so that we can build that better future.
Because when we have great infrastructure,
we have all the waterfall effects.
Our property values will go up,
more businesses will wanna be here,
we'll have more people coming to our city
because it is an incredible place to be,
but it's starting to slip.
And I know you guys have seen it.
And so a lot of that is investing our infrastructure,
putting aside that money,
but also investing in us, your public service workers.
Like we are doing so much with so little,
And with our vacancy rate, it is a struggle.
And I, unfortunately, in my short time here,
have seen people leave because of burnout.
Because sometimes it's not worth.
Like, you know, a lot of these people have fought
for many, many years.
And it's just sometimes you hang up the towel
because they don't feel like they're being heard.
They don't feel like they're being supported.
They don't feel like the city cares
about the things that they do,
which they are doing selflessly to build this city
into something great.
So I ask you guys to consider having that budget,
talk about that COLA and help make our infrastructure better.
Thank you.
Hello, my name is Ruth Mesa.
I'm a proud member of Local 21 and an Oakland resident.
I'm here to ask council to prioritize essential city services
by holding the city administration accountable.
Police overspending remains high.
OPD is projected to blow their overtime budget
by 17 million, civilianization is not advancing,
and the city administration has given no indication
that they plan to prioritize necessary changes
to OPOA's contract.
We need to be clear that OPT's overspending
comes at the cost of other services.
This is not a new issue.
Over the past decade, the department has outspent
their budget by tens of millions, all but one year.
And we need to recognize the cumulative effect
of overspending of this magnitude by a single department.
This has prevented the city from building up reserves
during economically good years.
Instead, we spent savings to balance overspending
in the police department.
That has left us with little financial cushion.
Since 2008, OPD overspending has cost the city $236 million.
Consider the cushion we could have had recently
that it prevented layoffs
and also prevented service cuts to openers.
City Council needs to hold the City Administration accountable for providing much needed city
services by actually reining in OPD over spending and budgeting for fair wages for civilian
workers.
Thank you.
Good morning.
My name is Michael Ford.
I'm an Oakland resident and a proud member of Local 21.
Like others, I'm here together with my colleagues to ask City Council to hold the City Administration
accountable for delivering the basic services that Oaklanders deserve.
As we've heard, OPD is projected to exceed overtime budget by $17 million this year.
Civilianization is not advancing, and as we've heard, that overspending is not abstract.
It directly comes at the expense of the services that civilian workers and local 21 workers
in particular provide every day.
Last week I learned that yet another experienced member of my team was making a lateral move
to another municipality offering approximately 20% more in pay.
The city has not conducted a wide-ranging salary survey since 2017.
It doesn't even know how its own wages compare to the market.
trust in Oakland's government is low. That is not on civilian represented employees.
It's on city leadership for writing a blank check to OPD while failing to invest in the
workforce that also delivers essential services. Committee, City Council, please rein in OPD
spending and budget fairly for your civilian workers. Thank you.
If you still wish to speak on this item,
please come up to the podium.
Kevin Daly, I appreciate the union thoughts
that we've been hearing.
I'm also concerned.
I also wonder how much of our good budget,
apparently good budget is due to the lack of hiring
and the freezing of positions,
both formal and informal freezing.
I noticed, particularly, I've noticed OatDOT
because I care about Oak Dot.
There are so many vacancies.
Of course it saves money,
but it means that we don't actually get things done.
I am, I'd like a clear statement.
You know, in the past year,
finance department has often made it difficult to hire.
I'd like to hear a clear statement
from the new finance director, Johnson,
that the finance department
will not slow down hiring going forward.
Glad to see that parking fine revenue has increased
now that we have hired more people to find people
and increasing on evening and Sunday parking.
I'd also like to see parking enforcement
dispatch positions hired.
Those are the ones that if I see someone
walking the curb cut, so my mother-in-law cannot get a wheelchair, onto the sidewalk.
That's a number I need to call. Those haven't been hired in years. I'm now told that I have to call the police department,
not civilianization. We need to make
enforcement positions whenever possible, move away from police and have the police officers do things that they are experts on,
Not ticketing it also be nice to add evening and weekend positions for the dispatch people people pluck
weekends and evenings also, thanks
Last call for Heidi John Cola Andrea Ramirez and David boat, right?
Thank you at this time chair. All names have been called
Mr. Boat right. Did you still wish to speak on this item? Okay
Okay, thank you. I will entertain a motion. Oh, sorry director Johnson. Did you have anything?
I do just want to confirm that the city is not currently in a hiring freeze for any positions and positions are moved forward
Through finance as fast as it can be approved
Thank you. I will entertain a motion
uh, so moved
Thank you. That was a motion made by councilmember wonk second by councilmember brown to receive and file this informational report
through the chair to the motion maker of the motion is this in committee or to forward
this to receive a file in committee or to okay thank you sorry again that was a motion
made by councilmember Wong second by councilmember Brown to receive and file this information
report in committee on roll council members Brown I under I Wong I and chair ramachandran
I thank you item number three passes with four eyes to receive and file this information
and report in committee.
Noting that item four regarding
the amending Oakland Municipal Code Chapter 4.56
was withdrawn from this agenda
and scheduled to the Finance and Management Committee
pending list under no date specific.
Reading in item number five,
adopt the following pieces of legislation.
One, a resolution adopting the City of Oakland
investment policy for fiscal year 2026 and 2027.
And two, a resolution pursuant to government code
Section 53607 delegating investment authority
to the open redevelopment successor agency
to the agency treasurer for fiscal year 2026 to 2027.
And we have one speaker that signed up to speak on this item.
Good morning Chair Ramachandra and fellow council members.
Max Kumar, Treasury Bureau Finance Department.
The resolutions in front of you are for adopting
the annual city of Oakland investment policy
for the upcoming fiscal year 2627.
There were just minor legislative changes.
State Bill 595 amended the state code
to reflect the changes to the commercial paper maturities
from 270 days to 397 days.
Also extended 40% of the portfolio cap
for commercial papers until January 31.
This bill also extended zero interest rate accrual
to January 31 as well.
Aside from this, there's just minor edits
and date changes to reflect the coming physical year, 2627.
This investment policy will cover both the city
and successor agency portfolios and the current portfolios
and full compliance with this policy.
The goal of this investment policy remains
to effectively manage for safety, liquidity, and yields.
With this, I'll be happy to take any questions, thank you.
Thank you, Colleen.
I'll just wanna make a note that we do bring back
your investment policy every year to reaffirm it.
That is a best practice for GFOA,
insurers as Max stated earlier,
that we are in compliance with all current federal guidelines
and as we go out toward the financial markets
to borrow having a recently adopted investment policy is one of the things
that looks that the market looks to calling in the name that sign up to
speak on item number five mr. Kevin Dalley who I do not see in chamber
chair all names have been called thank you thank you to the administration is
motion on consent to approve this
request to go to full council.
Yes.
I will entertain a motion for this to move to a full council
at the June second meeting on consent.
So moved.
Thank you.
That was a motion made by council member Brown second by
council member Unger to approve the recommendations of staff
and to board this item to the June 2nd, 2026 city council
agenda on consent on roll council members Brown.
Wanger?
Wong?
Excused.
Excused, and Chair Ramachandran?
Aye.
Thank you, item number five passes with three ayes,
one excused, Wong, to forward both pieces
to the June 2nd City Council agenda on consent.
Now reading in item six,
receive the informational cash management report
for fiscal year 2025 to 2026.
Third quarter ended March 31st, 2026,
And we have one speaker that signed up for this item.
Good morning Chair, I'm a challenger
and fellow council members,
Mexico Morrigan, Treasury Bureau Finance Department.
The report in front of you
is informational cash management report for the third quarter
ending in March 31st, 2026.
Highlights are listed on page one of the report.
The portfolio had a court end balance of $2.25 billion.
The days to maturity of the portfolio was very short,
stood at 279 days.
The yield was at 3.65%.
The daily liquidity of the portfolio was at 16.78%
and 180 day liquidity of the portfolio was at 60.02%.
The portfolio's in full compliance
with the city's investment policy
and the portfolio is invested for safety, liquidity, and yield.
With this, I'll be happy to take any questions, thank you.
Thank you.
And is this increase consistent with the last few years?
Correct.
It's about 5% march from last year to this year.
It's pretty consistent.
thank you thank you thank you
colleagues.
I just want to ask you to
emphasize again the sort of
seasonality of this report
that there had been some
reporting.
Earlier some full reporting
earlier in the year where they
compared one quarter to the
previous quarter as opposed to
comparing one quarter to the
same quarter in the previous
year what what is the correct
way to do comparisons in this.
Through the chair to the
if you want to in the next reports. But as far as the seasonality is the city's
portfolio balance will drop starting July all the way to December and then from
December all the way June is where the portfolio balance will increase. And this
is basically due to the first property tax that we get in December and that we
get the business tax and then the second portion of the property tax. So historically
property tax. So historically, the city will get, you know, revenues in the second part
of the year, you know, different red if it works.
To directly answer your question, Councilmember Unger, you can think of the city's cash position
a little bit like the weather. It can be hotter or colder, but we care about the long-run
trends in climate change, not actually whether or not it's cold outside. As Max mentioned,
it's typically warm for us in the spring, starts to get cool in the summer until it
gets to December and we get our resources in. I will note that actively managing this
is a key component of what the Treasury Bureau does. And in order to help manage this at
your council meeting, we are asking you to go through various steps to approve temporary
revenue anticipation notes or trans, which do help us smooth our cash flow over the course
of the years. So it's not just that we manage it in the direct way now, but we actively
manage it by going to the market to ensure that we always have sufficient liquidity for
for the city's imports assets.
Hey, Council Member Wong.
Hi, I'm just wondering,
what have we done to explore just increasing our yields?
I was doing a little bit of reading,
and, for example, in San Francisco,
they have a higher yield than we do.
They're at 3.85% compared to us.
And it seems that part of what they did
is they made a deliberate investment decision
to move towards,
you know I'm not I'm not a
financial investment expert
here but I'm just pushing some
of these questions around
negotiable CDs and commercial
commercial paper and they
actually in terms of the
federal bonds they're capped at
44% whereas we're doing more of
the investments on the federal
side of things so just wondering
if we've explored this sure
to compare different cities because different cities have different reserve balances, they
have different cash flow needs. So let's be, you know, comparing apple to oranges. However,
city and county of San Francisco has a roughly 10 billion portfolio and we have a 2 billion
portfolio. We do have a location in noticeable CDs and commercial paper, but we are very
cautious of corporate names, you know, that fit through our, you know, ordinance and resolutions.
And it just depends on liquidity needs for the city.
We feel that this is a very safe portfolio and they have any, you know, economic downturn
with credit rating downturn.
Federal agencies are pretty much next to treasuries, which is very safe.
So I'm – and the yield is not that much of a difference, plus the yield is just dependent
on our cash flow needs.
city of Oakland historically spends a lot of money
in an operating year, and we do have not that much
of a larger reserve fund balance.
So that's one of the reasons we're not that far apart
from 3.65% to 3.8% is only 25 basis point.
But in our short-term needs are probably geared.
I cannot speak for city of San Francisco.
However, our long-term and short-term rates
follow basically what the Fed calls the discount notes and also the level set at the Federal
Reserve which is between 3.75% and 4% right now.
Sure.
I understand but it looks like if we, you know, because we are at the point in time
where we need to like, you know, search the couch for, you know, for coin so to speak
and so I'm just asking these questions since even though that's just 0.2% of a difference
it could make a difference in terms of bringing
maybe a couple million dollars of extra GPF to the city
and we are operating in a deficit.
So my other question is just around something called
a, like our local government investment pools.
So beyond our investments in LAIF,
I understand that there could be opportunities
to pursue investments in joint powers of authority
their county pools.
Is that something that we're looking into?
Yes, is there something we're looking at?
We're having actually the city's attorney's office
taking a look at this right now.
They have a specific agreement,
and we'll be looking into putting some money in that camp
once the city attorney reviews all the documents.
Okay, good.
Thank you. Thank you.
If there are no other questions,
we can move to public comments.
Calling in the name that's signed up
to speak on item number six, Mr. Kevin Dalley.
Thank you all names have been called chair.
Okay, I will entertain a motion to receive
and file this report in committee.
If that's okay with staff, okay.
So moved, does it need to.
Second.
Full council we can stay in committee then.
Thank you, we have a motion made by council member Unger,
seconded by council member Brown
to approve the recommendations of staff
and to receive and file this informational report
and committee on the role council members Brown.
Aye.
Unger.
Aye.
Wong.
Mayor Ramachandran.
Hi.
Thank you.
Item six passes with four ayes to receive and file this informational report in committee.
Moving on to open forum, calling in the name that's signed up to speak, Mr. Kevin Dalley.
Okay.
That concludes all speakers.
Okay.
Thank you.
This meeting is adjourned.