Cities plan Sacramento trip to seek lost revenue

April 15, 2013

REGION: Cities plan Sacramento trip to seek lost revenue

State Sen. Richard Roth, D-Riverside, introduced Senate Bill 56. The bill would tap property tax revenue to replace millions of dollars cities lost when the state budget shifted vehicle-license fee revenue to local law enforcement grants.

 

BY SANDRA STOKLEY

STAFF WRITER Riverside Press Enterprise

Published: April 15, 2013; 04:27 PM

 

Officials from three of Riverside County’s four newest cities will travel to Sacramento this week in a bid to reclaim state money they say they need to adequately serve their constituents.

Eastvale, Jurupa Valley and Wildomar are sending delegations to the Wednesday, April 17, hearing on Senate Bill 56 before the legislature’s Governance and Finance Committee. Menifee is sending a letter supporting the bill. The 9:30 a.m. hearing will be broadcast live on calchannel.com.

It is the first in a series of hearings on the senate bill that would tap property tax revenue to replace millions of dollars the cities lost nearly two years ago when a state budget shifted millions of dollars in vehicle-license fee revenue to local law enforcement grants.

The shift hit the state’s four newest cities – all of them in Riverside County – hardest.

The vehicle-license fee shift came just two days before Jurupa Valley officially incorporated on July 1, 2011, and the city of nearly 100,000 has struggled to remain solvent since then.

Jurupa Valley Mayor Verne Lauritzen, who will head to Sacramento with Councilwoman Laura Roughton, said Monday, April 15, that he will seek to put a “personal face” on the issue when he testifies.

“We are a city in peril,” Lauritzen said. “I want them to feel the urgency and desperation that we feel.”

Over the past two fiscal years, Jurupa Valley has lost more than $13 million in state revenue and was forced to cut its public safety budget by 10 percent for the 2012-2013 fiscal year.

Jurupa Valley, Wildomar and Menifee also had to renegotiate financial obligations they owed to Riverside County that included payments for services the county provided during the cities’ transition from unincorporated areas to full-fledged cities.

Eastvale, which received only one $3.2 million payment of vehicle-license fee money, is negotiating its own agreement with Riverside County. Eastvale City Manager Carol Jacobs said the city is owed an estimated $6.7 million for fiscal years 2011-12 and 2012-13.

Like Jurupa Valley, Eastvale has cut its public safety budget from two deputies and three community services officers to one deputy and one community service office. It also has reduced patrol hours to a minimum level from 94 service hours a day to 70 service hours.

Eastvale will be represented at the hearing by Councilmen Adam Rush and Jeff DeGrandpre.

Rush said he will try to stress that amount needed to restore the cities to fiscal health “is so miniscule.”

“But it is so vital to the new cities,” Rush said.

Councilman Ben Benoit, who will represent Wildomar, said his city has had to reduce levels of police service by half.

“Our residents need more,” Benoit said. “We cannot sit idly by.”’

Wildomar incorporated in 2008 and received three years of vehicle-license fee revenue before legislators voted for the shift. Wildomar has lost an estimated $3.7 over the past two fiscal years, according to figures provided by the city.

Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed a bill last year to restore money to the new cities and also help older cities, such as Fontana, that had recently annexed populated territory. Brown said the state could not afford the expense, estimated at $18 million annually.

Senate Bill 56, introduced earlier this year by state Sens. Richard Roth, D-Riverside, and Bill Emmerson, R-Hemet, would take a share of the local property-tax money that now goes to schools and give it to the cities hurt by the 2011 budget shift.

Under California’s school-funding guarantee, the state would have to make up the difference for the diverted property tax revenue. It has not been determined where that money would come from.

Jason Gonsalves, a lobbyist for the four cities and Fontana, said the biggest hurdle facing the bill is its $19 million price tag.

Jurupa Valley City Manager Stephen Harding said that, if the money is not restored and nothing changes, the city can last another three to four years.

Of more immediate concern, is balancing the budget for the 2013-2014 fiscal year.

“The council realizes they will have to do something,” Harding said.