The Riverside County Board of Supervisors Tuesday approved a $10.3 billion proposed budget, a 3.4% increase from last year’s adopted budget. The budget, scheduled to be formally adopted June 23, is set to be the county’s second deficit budget in a row.
“This year, county departments submitted approximately $700 million in requests for additional discretionary general fund revenue above our existing funding levels,” County Executive Officer Jeff Van Wagenen said at the June 8 public hearing. “At the same time, the county continues to face rising labor costs, health care expenses, infrastructure needs, technology investments, and an increasing demand for services.”
Stay up to date with the latest from The Record. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter today!
In an effort to balance those competing realities, Van Wagenen said the county was presenting a budget that reflected a series of “deliberate decisions” to preserve core services, maintain reserves, avoid layoffs and start addressing the deficit.
“We evaluated requests based on legal requirements, public safety impacts, health and human service needs, strategic priorities established by the board of supervisors, operational risk and long-term sustainability,” he said. “The challenge before us is determining which priorities can be funded within the county’s available resources.”
In order to cover the county’s expenses for the upcoming fiscal year, which starts July 1 and runs through June 30 of next year, Van Wagenen suggested using $66 million from the county’s general fund reserves. He said the county would also be continuing with a number of operational controls implemented this year to curb spending, including a hiring freeze for departments that receive general fund dollars, a maximum fill rate for selected departments and the continued use of “just in time funding.”
Of the roughly $10.3 billion in revenue, $3.1 billion is from state funds and $1.5 billion is from federal funds, making the county heavily dependent on decisions made by lawmakers in both Sacramento and Washington, D.C.
On the expenses side, roughly $3.1 billion is slated to go to health and hospital services, $2.4 billion is slated to go to public safety, about $2 billion is set to go to human services, $1.1 billion is set to go to public works and community services, about $953 million is slated to go to internal services, and about $744 million is set to go to finance and government services.
Of the $10.3 billion, $8.9 billion is restricted, meaning it can only be used for specific programs and purposes. The remaining $1.45 billion is discretionary, meaning the county can use that funding as it sees fit.
The discretionary funding is split between the county’s six portfolios with public safety getting the lion’s share at 62%, finance and government services receiving 14%, human services getting 12%, health and hospital services getting 8%, public works and community servicings receiving 3% and internal services getting 1%.
Also included in the budget were $20 million for the augmentation fund, which the supervisors allocate during the budget hearings, $20 million for the contingency fund, which is reserved for emergency board action, and $12.5 million for the Unincorporated Communities Initiative, which the supervisors spend throughout the fiscal year.
The supervisors allocated the full augmentation fund as well as $7.4 million in one-time prop 172 reserves, specifically set aside for public safety, to cover the costs of certain requests made during this week’s public hearing.
Of these funds, the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office received an additional $678,919 to create a new full-time cybercrimes unit, as requested by District Attorney Mike Hestrin.
Hestrin also requested an additional $13.8 million to maintain current staffing levels, which Van Wagenen said would be handled using “just in time” funding, and $1.7 million to replace aging equipment from Prop 172 funds, but Van Wagenen said that was not necessary because this was already included in the recommended budget.
The Riverside County Sheriff’s Office received an additional $7.4 million in one-time Prop 172 funds for continued software upgrades and $1.1 million in augmentation funds for contract forensic pathologists at the request of Sheriff Chad Bianco.
Bianco also requested $124 million to maintain current staffing levels and $5.3 million to cover increased insurance costs, stating that if the department did not get the additional funding, the impacts would be catastrophic for the department and lead to mass reductions in staff.
“The cost of public safety has never been realized in Riverside County,” he said. “And I certainly appreciate the position that we’re in [with] the budget for this coming year, but the proposed budget for us is absolutely disastrous, unfortunately.”
Van Wagenen said the county would continue to work with the sheriff’s department using “just in time” funding throughout the fiscal year to ensure the department can continue to maintain essential services.
“What this budget does is it does not require anybody to lay anybody off out of the general fund immediately, and the goal is that that would not happen,” he said. “What we are talking about is managing the attrition in such a way, so that we will allocate dollars to departments, as we did this current fiscal year and the next fiscal year, just in time, based upon their actual needs.”
Van Wagenen noted that since 2020, the sheriff’s department has grown from 3,766 employees to its current 4,340 employees.
The Riverside County Fire Department received an additional $895,311 for emergency command center dispatch staff, at the request of Chief Deputy Geoffrey Pemberton on behalf of Fire Chief Robert Fish. This was the department’s only request.
“We were trying to be as efficient and thoughtful as we could,” Pemberton said.
The Riverside County Auditor-Controller’s Office received an additional $509,000 for new administration and accounting staff at the request of Auditor-Controller Ben Benoit. This was the department’s only request.
The Riverside County Registrar of Voters (ROV) received an additional $132,315 for a new elections outreach coordinator at the request of ROV Art Tinoco. This was the department’s only request.
“This role could further ensure Riverside County residents receive clear, consistent and trusted information about elections before, during, and after an election cycle,” Tinoco said. “Some of the key responsibilities for this particular position that I’m asking for is voter engagement initiatives and public education campaigns, which includes digital communications and social media strategy, multimedia content production and management, community events planning and coordination, and also they would serve as a backup and redundancy for critical communication.”
The Riverside County Department of Animal Services (RCDAS) received an additional $250,000 for a community outreach campaign at the request of RCDAS Director Mary Martin. This was the department’s only request.
“With all this good work that we’re doing, not everyone knows about it, and we want to make sure that they do,” Martin said. “We also want to have an opportunity to educate our community about what kind responsible pet ownership looks like [and] how educating people could perhaps help us reduce the need for intake and keep pets in their home.”
The Riverside County Agricultural Commissioner’s Office received an additional $149,863 in funding for a new investigation supervisor as requested by Agricultural Commissioner-Sealer Delia Jimenez Cioc. This was the department’s only request.
“Establishing this role is a necessary step to ensure we continue protecting consumers and maintain the quality and reliability of services that residents and businesses depend on,” Cioc said. “The position will strengthen compliance, reduce liability, improve service delivery, and ensure we can meet both statutory requirements and the expectations of Riverside County’s residents and businesses.”
The Riverside County Office of Economic Development received an additional $350,000, which included $250,000 for the department’s innovation and entrepreneur centers and $100,000 for the film commission to market the county as a “premier filming location,” as requested by Director Suzanne Holland. This was the department’s only request.
“This 350,000 investment will continue to drive economic growth by attracting businesses, growing businesses, strengthening our workforce, and creating high quality jobs,” Holland said. “The long-term value of this investment will generate sustainable returns for Riverside County residents and businesses.”
The Riverside County Transportation and Land Management Agency Planning Department received a total of $900,000 in additional funding to cover the cost of implementing a number of unfunded state mandates and county-initiated projects at the request of Planning Director John Hildebrand. The department had no additional requests.
Riverside County Veterans Services received $106,918 in additional funding for a new veteran service representative at the request of Director Adam French. This was the department’s only request.
“This position’s primary purpose is to ensure accurate workload reporting, improve audit readiness, protect county reimbursement opportunities and allow our accredited claims representative staff to spend more time directly serving veterans and their families,” French said.
The Riverside County Office on Aging received an additional $315,000 for the home delivery of meals to seniors at the request of Director Rachelle Román. This was the department’s only request.
“Our meal providers have done an exceptional job stretching resources and implementing efficiencies, but without additional support, the number of meals provided and the number of older adults we can serve will continue to decline,” Román said. “This creates significant risk to our home-delivered meal participants, who depend on daily meals and wellness checks to remain safely in their homes.”
Supervisors also provided the department with an additional $986,000 in order to continue funding congregate meals for seniors five days per week. This decision was made after Román said the department was planning to cut service to four days per week starting July 1.
“I just think it’s important,” Supervisor V. Manuel Perez said. “If we’re going to do one, we should do both, because we’re trying to feed folks.”
The final county department to receive funds was Riverside County Housing and Workforce Solutions, which was given an additional $5 million for affordable housing at the request of Director Heidi Marshall. This was the department’s only request.
“We recognize that state and federal dollars just don’t get handed out, they go to counties that already have skin in the game,” Marshall said. “[This funding] also allows us to leverage all of the other funding, something that the team is really good about.”
The supervisors also allocated $2.5 million to increase the Unincorporated Communities Initiative fund to $15 million, $4 million to the contingency fund, bringing it up to a little over $24 million, $600,000 to Inland SoCal United Way for continued funding of 211 and $1 million to Coachella Valley-based nonprofit Lift to Rise to continue scaling its work to support affordable housing across the county.
Other unfunded requests included $6.5 million from Assessor-County Clerk-Recorder Peter Aldana to maintain current service levels at both the assessor’s office and the clerk-recorder’s office, which Van Wagenen said would be handled throughout the year using “just in time” funding.
The county also received a request from the Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability to increase the Unincorporated Communities Initiative fund to $20 million, but Van Wagenen said many of the group’s concerns were reflected in the funding for Housing and Workforce Solutions and Lift to Rise
The supervisors also chose not to fund a $1.5 million request from Moreno Valley-based nonprofit Consortium for Early Learning Services.
This week’s public hearing was the final step in the budget process before the board is set to adopt the budget June 23.
Prior to last week’s release of the recommended budget, supervisors received the results of the county’s community budget outreach, which included a budget survey and five in-person community workshops. Results of that public input found public works and affordable housing were among county residents’ top concerns.
The Riverside Record is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news outlet providing Riverside County with high-quality journalism free of charge. We’re able to do this because of the generous donations of supporters like you!