City Adopts $3.6B FY25 Budget

During a Long Beach City Council meeting on Tues. Sept. 10, city councilmembers officially voted to pass a $3.6 billion budget for the city’s 2025 Fiscal Year.

A culmination of 23 public meetings, discussions for the FY 25 Budget first began in January and ramped up in August of this year. According to the City of Long Beach, the initiatives included in the city’s 2024-2025 budget aim to shape a future where all of the city’s diverse community members have a safe, clean and healthy place to live, work and thrive.

“The C.O.R.E. Four Budget reflects our commitment to a safe, healthy and thriving Long Beach – it is a blueprint for growth, opportunity, sustainability and delivering quality services,” said Mayor Rex Richardson. “By thoughtfully adapting to this changing landscape of how we fund core services, we are ensuring that Long Beach can continue to address immediate needs while securing the city’s long-term financial stability.”

The new investments made in the Adopted FY 25 Budget are stated to take into consideration priorities from the Long Beach City Council and key areas identified in the Long Beach Strategic Vision 2030, as well as community feedback from Long Beach residents throughout the year. The priorities for the FY 25 Budget include, but are not limited to:

Public Safety

As a sign of commitment to the safety and wellbeing of the Long Beach community, the budget will reportedly support all existing, as well as new, initiatives to achieve a variety of public safety. This is said to include a one-time funding of $1.3 million for the High Crime Focus Team (HCFT), a task force with the focus working to help reduce shootings and gun crime throughout the city. With this one-time funding, the HCFT will “proactively address violent crime citywide by taking illegal guns off the streets, apprehend known suspects and enhance overall safety through measurable and increased community engagement, education and collaborative enforcement,” according to an official press release.

As another priority for Long Beach’s public safety, the city’s FY 25 Budget will also be increasing funding for emergency medical equipment, fire station utility expenses and fire station maintenance and repair costs for the Long Beach Fire Department. The budget will also provide $2.1 million in funds to operate the Fire Recruit Academy 2025A class, which consists of 50 recruits.

Housing & Homelessness

The city of Long Beach is also reportedly staying true to its commitment to providing and identifying more funding and programs for affordable housing.

These efforts include a one-time donation of $375,000 to continue support of the Stay Housed Los Angeles Tenant Assistance Program. The program was launched back in 2020 in partnership between Los Angeles County, the City of Los Angeles and local community and legal service providers, with a focus in providing free legal assistance to tenants facing wrongful eviction, landlord harassment, slum conditions and other housing-related problems

The one-time funding of $375,000 will bring the amount of funds available to the program to a grand total of $1.05 million in FY 25.

The FY 25 budget will also be providing funds in its continued efforts to combat the issue of homelessness in the city.

The budget will be providing $545,048 of grant funding to implement an Office of Homeless Strategy and Partnerships within the Office of the City Manager. This new Office is said to provide critical support and implementation of the ongoing planning and partnerships related to the city’s Homelessness Strategic Plan Update, as well as streamline the city’s homelessness response and increase coordination efforts across Long Beach city departments.

Elevate ‘28

Outside of investments being made for community resources, Long Beach’s FY 25 budget is also putting a lot of money into the Elevate ‘28 Infrastructure Investment Plan. Being the largest infrastructure investment plan in Long Beach to date, the plan is said to include transformative infrastructure investments across over 180 unique projects, including:

Revitalization of Long Beach’s infrastructure

Continued support of the Westside Promise investment plan.

Enhancement of local parks and visitor-serving areas across Long Beach.

Investments made in the budget for Elevate ‘28 are also being used to help prepare the city as a major Venue City for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games, as the city is expected host several of Olympic events such as handball, sailing, water polo and the triathlon.

As of FY 25, Elevate ‘28 is supported with $306 million of Measure A funds and $622 million from other funding sources for a total of $928 million.

Long Beach’s FY 25 will officially begin on Oct. 1, 2024 and end on Sept. 30, 2025. For more information on Long Beach’s FY 25 Budget, including the full breakdown of the many investments being made, you can visit the city’s official website at https://www.longbeach.gov/press-releases/long-beach-city-council-adopts-...