Great news: Fresno gets $50M in state budget. Wasn’t it supposed to be $250M? | Opinion
When does $50 million in free money from Sacramento feel like a letdown?
When everyone practically assumed Fresno — specifically its infrastructure-needy downtown — was to receive five times that amount.
Rather presumptively, as things have turned out.
Beating their own self-imposed deadline to continue getting paid, California lawmakers on Thursday approved a $312 billion spending plan for the next 12 months.
In the budget’s executive branch section, under a line item listed as “Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development,” is a $50 million allocation “to support the city of Fresno’s Public Infrastructure Plan.”
The same infrastructure and investment plan touted by Gov. Gavin Newsom himself during his May budget revise. And shortly thereafter trumpeted by Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer and others.
Only Fresno’s slice was supposed to be $250 million — not $50 million. Money to invest in downtown’s decaying water and sewer systems and improve parking, green space, public transit and sidewalks in order to ultimately attract residential development.
So what happened to the “other” $200 million?
That’s a question that requires a bit of nuance and may also turn out to be presumptuous. But let’s try anyway.
One answer is that the $250 million for downtown Fresno was never assured. Rather, it came as a result of a strong push from Assemblyman Joaquin Arambula that Newsom endorsed and included in his budget revise. Meanwhile, state Sen. Anna Caballero managed to get the allocation included in the Senate’s budget bill.
However, the Legislature’s other branch had other thoughts. The Assembly’s budget bill left out Fresno’s earmark entirely. So just getting to $50 million in the version passed by lawmakers Thursday required negotiations.
Another piece is that no one ever specified whether the $250 million would come to Fresno all at once. One proposal being floated by the Assembly Budget Committee is to allocate $50 million during this budget cycle, followed by $100 million more in the next two.
Finally, the 2023-24 budget isn’t quite put to bed. Lawmakers have until the end of June to enact trailer bills, meaning there are two weeks for Arambula (whose district includes downtown Fresno) to lobby his colleagues that $50 million isn’t enough.
“We’re still waiting for more negotiations to take place and for the governor to weigh in,” Fresno City Councilmember Miguel Arias said. “I’m confident that when all is said and done that number won’t remain at $50 million … and we’ll be working the phones all weekend to try and get there.”
Too good to be true?
Even when Newsom pitched the idea and Dyer happily signed on, downtown Fresno getting $250 million in state money felt a little too good to be true.
Why did I get that inkling? As always, the devil was in the details.
It was tough to take issue with much of the city’s spending plan: $80 million to develop vacant land into new housing; $45 million to replace century-old water and sewer lines; $20 million for a transit center linking high-speed rail and city/regional bus service; $20 million for street and sidewalk improvements; $15 million for new pocket and linear parks.
Only through these types of investments will downtown Fresno attract enough housing development (both market rate and affordable) to achieve Dyer’s goal of growing the number of residents living in the city’s core from about 3,000 to 10,000.
“Infrastructure challenges have long been the largest obstacle to getting any type of housing built downtown,” Arias said.
However, a $70 million earmark to construct two new parking structures raised not only my eyebrows, but those of local environmental justice groups critical that Fresno could be awarded so much money with so little specific language over how it gets spent.
Turns out, from what I’m told, the new parking structures are intended more for downtown’s future high-speed rail station than any other purpose. But since the bullet train isn’t so popular these days, that part was kept quiet.
During a May 12 press conference, Dyer lauded what he termed a “historic” investment in downtown Fresno.
“We are, indeed, teed up and ready to do something transformational,” the mayor said. “This $250 million is the kind of boost that will get us across the finish line and allow Fresno to realize its destiny as one of California’s premier cities.”
Not sure how far $50 million gets us. Probably somewhere nice, but short of transformative. Still, as the saying goes, it’s better than a poke in the eye with a flaming stick.
