City sees more revenue than expenses in next two budget years, as City Council adopts documents

Yorba Linda finally has operating budgets for this and the next fiscal year – adopted on a 4-1 vote two and a half months after the current budget year began July 1 – with revenue expected to outpace expenditures for both 2015-16 and 2016-17.

This is the second two-year budget approved by the City Council after a couple years of one-year spending plans during the recent recession. The lone “no” vote came from Craig Young, who favored a single-year plan.

Of course, the budgets won't remain static for the next two years, as the council always reviews income and outgo numbers during six-month intervals and either tightens or loosens the purse strings as the local economy waxes and wanes.

Surplus is expected to be about $1.2 million for 2015-16 and $360,000 for 2016-17, even with a $2.4 million transfer each year to the Landscape Maintenance Assessment District, some to subsidize deficits in several of the city's 46 local landscape zones that cover 52 percent of city residences.

Revenue is projected to be near $33 million in 2015-16 and just over that figure in 2016-17.

Most landscape zone funds come from assessments on real estate due with property taxes, with $5.7 million to be collected this year from arterial and local zones.

Most operating budget revenue – some 49 percent – comes from property taxes, with 21 percent from sales taxes, 10 percent from franchise fees on utilities and business licenses and taxes and the rest from planning, engineering and recreation fees plus rents and interest.

Spending includes 36 percent for policing, 21 percent for parks and recreation,19 percent for general government, 13 percent for public works and 11 percent for community development.

Four highlights from the 83-page budget document:

--General fund expenditures for police services, including the contracted crossing guards, will take nearly $10.3 million this year and $10.5 million next year from the city's general fund, up from more than $9.3 million last year.

Among policing objectives: maintain “priority 1” response times of less than five minutes, use proactive patrol activity to deter criminal activity and “improve aggressive traffic enforcement.”

--The library expects more than $4.5 million annual income the next two years from its separate property tax stream as a former independent district (1914-1985), with $500,000 added to reserves each year, savings to help finance a new facility.

--The Black Gold Golf Club expects revenues close to $6 million this year and just over that amount next year, with more than $6.4 million expenses this year and just over $6.6 million next year, figures that include $850,000 depreciation.

--And remember the city's Redevelopment Agency the state dissolved in 2012? Its property tax income from Savi Ranch-Hidden Hills and Town Center-Imperial Highway project areas is handled by the council and will total from $6-7 million, equal to expenditures.