The June 6, 2024 edition of the Outlook Valley Sun featured an article on the city of La Cañada Flintridge’s newly-adopted budget for fiscal year 2024-25 with the headline “City Balances Budget With Revenue from Measure LCF.”
While the article itself provides a good summary of the budget, the headline gives a misleading impression that the new revenue anticipated from Measure LCF — the 0.75% increase in the Sales Tax approved by residents this past March — was needed to “balance” the city’s budget.
In fact, the new funding was not needed to balance the budget. The $1.6 million in Measure LCF revenue anticipated for the upcoming fiscal year, which constitutes only a partial year of these receipts scheduled to begin arriving in December, enabled the city to fund some additional needs and expand services without the need to dip into reserves.
Specifically, the new revenue anticipated from Measure LCF will be utilized to fund the following items in the upcoming fiscal year:
- A 9% increase in the Public Safety budget over the current year’s public safety spending;
- A major new community emergency preparedness initiative involving extensive public education and community outreach to better prepare residents for the range of potential emergencies and disaster events;
- Additional Flock security cameras and a Home Security and Alarm Rebate Program;
- Multiple new capital projects, including critical storm drain and street pavement repairs, and as well as major new funding for contract engineering services that will speed the completion of the city’s considerable capital project backlog
The city is dedicated to being transparent with all its funding, and Measure LCF is no exception. I am committed to creating an advisory group to advise the City Council and city staff on allocating Measure LCF funds in a manner consistent with the priorities identified during the campaign to adopt the measure.
A final point to emphasize is that as the city begins to receive Measure LCF revenue, we will provide regular updates and reports on how this money is being spent. This will follow through on the city’s commitment to not only spend Measure LCF dollars on new and expanded services and projects, but to also ensure that the city remains transparent and accountable in managing this new source of funds made available by our residents.
Mike Davitt
Mayor of La Cañada Flintridge
First published in the June 13 print issue of the Outlook Valley Sun.
