Where the Money Goes: Irvine Edition
Posted by: tylerh | 07/21/2008 7:02 AM
Hello!
I (tylerh) have joined the OC Blogpen to focus on Irvine and to provide a "center" voice within OC Blog's center-right political orientation. I'm not much of a Bush-style "conservative," but I heartily agree with the OCBlog community that the government interferes too much and often spends our tax dollars unwisely. Financial Conservatism never goes out of style.
To help you be a more informed financial conservative I've prepared a quiz. Below is a list City of Irvine expenditures, followed by the names of the budget category. Can you match them up?
More interestingly, please guess in the comments what these budget categories mean. For example, what do you think is the difference between "Community Services" and "Community Development"? What does a still-growing town only thirty years old do with a "redevelopment" budget?
Expenditure
1. $49,435,4582.
2. $28,828,873
3. $28,563,789
4. $7,265,625.
5. $6,340,217
6. $7,177,441
7. $2,462,011
Budget Category
1. Public Safety
2. Community Services
3. Pubic Works
4. "Non-Departmental"
5. Administrative Services
6. Community Development
7. "Redevelopment"
Bonus question:
What is the name of Fund 180, which has projected revenue of $75,015,267, expenditure of $43,250,000, but is only budgeted for $2,462,011 in the Irvine's budget?
The answers are below the fold, and also on the City of Irvine website. Answers
The expenditures and the categories are in the same order. That is, $49,435,458 is for Public safety, while $2,462,011 is for "Redevelopment." Being a financial conservative should be easy.
Bonus Question
Fund 180 is the "Orange County Great Park Corporation," which is not to be confused with Fund 280, the "Orange County Great Park Improvements CFD." Fund 280 is budgeted for $98.5 million dollars of expenditure over the next year.
Catch that? Great Park expenditures for the next fiscal year appear to almost equal to the official City of Irvine budget, but barely appear on that budget. Who says budgets are boring?
I (tylerh) have joined the OC Blogpen to focus on Irvine and to provide a "center" voice within OC Blog's center-right political orientation. I'm not much of a Bush-style "conservative," but I heartily agree with the OCBlog community that the government interferes too much and often spends our tax dollars unwisely. Financial Conservatism never goes out of style.
To help you be a more informed financial conservative I've prepared a quiz. Below is a list City of Irvine expenditures, followed by the names of the budget category. Can you match them up?
More interestingly, please guess in the comments what these budget categories mean. For example, what do you think is the difference between "Community Services" and "Community Development"? What does a still-growing town only thirty years old do with a "redevelopment" budget?
Expenditure
1. $49,435,4582.
2. $28,828,873
3. $28,563,789
4. $7,265,625.
5. $6,340,217
6. $7,177,441
7. $2,462,011
Budget Category
1. Public Safety
2. Community Services
3. Pubic Works
4. "Non-Departmental"
5. Administrative Services
6. Community Development
7. "Redevelopment"
Bonus question:
What is the name of Fund 180, which has projected revenue of $75,015,267, expenditure of $43,250,000, but is only budgeted for $2,462,011 in the Irvine's budget?
The answers are below the fold, and also on the City of Irvine website. Answers
The expenditures and the categories are in the same order. That is, $49,435,458 is for Public safety, while $2,462,011 is for "Redevelopment." Being a financial conservative should be easy.
Bonus Question
Fund 180 is the "Orange County Great Park Corporation," which is not to be confused with Fund 280, the "Orange County Great Park Improvements CFD." Fund 280 is budgeted for $98.5 million dollars of expenditure over the next year.
Catch that? Great Park expenditures for the next fiscal year appear to almost equal to the official City of Irvine budget, but barely appear on that budget. Who says budgets are boring?
Mr. Ayer registered as a Republican to be electable in an interim election with no incumbents. He did...
Community Service used to be known everywhere as the Parks and Rec Dept; similarly Community Development was known as the Building Dept. Then municipal bureaucratic metastasis set in as all sorts of functions were discovered to be necessary for the operation of a city.
The question about Redevelopment is particulary interesting. Under state law (Health & Safet Code) redevelopment projects are established to remove "blight." Does Irvine have blight? Of course not. So in reality redevelopment in Irvine could only be a way to divert property tax increment.
BTW, thank your lucky stars you are not a "Bush Conservative." Pretty soon they are going to have to apply for endangered species status.
They'll let anyone blog here now, LOL. Congrats Tyler on the new gig. As for the topic of the post, is anyone really surprised at the huge budget of the Park? So far all they can do is send out slick mailers telling everyone about all the great things that haven't happened yet.
Nice explanation, Red.
As best as I can tell, "redevelopment" is the budget vehicle by which General Fund money gets sent to the Great Park.
Nice description, Red. As best as I can tell, redevelopment is how General Fund money gets sent to the Great Park
Tylerh:
Seems consistent with the old adage “show me your check book and I will show you your god”. Although we cannot speak to efficiency, for any of the items you listed. it seems that city leaders have placed public safety at the top of priority the list.
Any other insight specific to public safety?
No.
Redevelopment Funds and General Funds have nothing to do with each other. In fact law prohibits Redevelopment paying for General Fund expenses or even Capital expenses unless the latter can be shown to support the redevelopment projects. Of course nobody polices redevelopment agencies so...
OTOH, a redevelopment project created on the El Toro site could be used to funnel vast amounts of property tax increment (almost always generated from the general increase in property values - not as the CRA would have us believe - through the redevelopment process) to the park itself. The argument could be made that the old base with all its vast runways, attendant anomalies and pollution problems is itself a giant blight that needs to be wiped out. That might explain what's going on.
You'd better ask Larry.
BTW, tyler you are to be commended for digging in to a municipal budget. They are pretty complicated documents. I used to spend a lot of time trying to understand Fullerton's budget and I arrived at two conclusions.
1) the documents and funding sources are so byzantine that almost nobody really understands them; and
2) city managers and finance directors like it that way.
Red:
Thanks for the follow up. In fairness, Irvine makes it pretty easy to figure out. It's 300+ page document, but it's a well-organized document. Irvine even won the "Distinguished Budget Presentation Award" from the Government Finance Officers Association in 2006.
Allan:
Please email me ( garbage11 at cox dot net ). I would like your help with an upcoming post. We Ron Paul supporters need to stick together 8)
CotoBloggzz:
Thank you for your question about the Public Safety budget item. There are some interesting numbers that the directly address your question on your question on pages 170-174 of the budget.
I am concerned that the "Percent of Public Safety Department General Fund operating budget support devoted to the police operations
division" has declined from 71.5% to 67.6% over the past two years, while the "Percent of Public Safety general fund operating support for Business Services and Professional Development" has increased from 22.6% to 26.3%. Red's "bureaucratic metastasis" may be alive and well in the Irvine Police budget.
Overall the budget authors are very proud of the large police expenditures; indeed, the first bullet point of the "City Manager’s Budget Message" is
Maintain a high level of commitment to safety by devoting 38% of all full-time staffing (191 sworn police officers and 92 support staff) to the Public Safety department
Our city checkbook has indeed revealed one of our two civic gods. But Irvine taxpayers, beware: the final bullet point is Explore the feasibility of a new Police Headquarters, even though we're still paying off the bonds for the current Police Facility. Interest on those bonds is the largest single item in the "non-departmental" budget category. Our chosen god can be an expensive god.