Fullerton’s Fiscal Ship About to Take on Water. Nobody Has a Clue What to Do
A few weeks ago the Daily Titan published an article about how, in a few years, Fullerton is going to be running in the red. Deep red. City projections point to being upside down $19 million between 2024 and 2028. Now that’s not very good, is it?
Here’s the grim forecast:
Naturally, the article quickly devolved into a vehicle for advocating the hiring of more people and paying them more, replete with completely fraudulent comparative pay statistics. On hand were Ahmad Zahra and his helper Shana Charles to bleat about unfilled positions and service deficits, always the first opening salvo in a new tax proposal – like the one Zahra pushed hard in 2020.
Doug Chaffee, the senile Fourth District Supervisor of Orange County and a former Fullerton mayor contributed this gem to the conversation: “I think I would have been a little heavier on keeping our staff because they are the lifeblood of the city. They do the work.” Uh, huh. He failed to mention his own inept culpability in mismanaging Fullerton’s budget for years.
Hilariously, Zahra seems to think the phrase “economic development” has some sort of talismanic quality, as if there were anything City Hall could do to produce it. It never worked during the heyday of Redevelopment and it won’t do anything now. It’s just a shiny distraction that can’t even pay for the bumblers who are paid, and paid very well, to pursue it.
What economic development really means is a focus on increasing tax revenue to pay for the salaries and benefits of public employees and their bloated, guaranteed pensions. It would be refreshing if just once elected folks thought about less about raising revenue and more about living within budgetary constraints.
Mayor Fred Jung calmly opined that Fullerton has adequate reserves to handle the tsunami of red ink coming his way, but this is not reassuring. Fullerton went through the same crimson bath during the Fitzgerald/Chaffee/Quirk-Silva/Flory/Zahra regime, and anybody who thinks Fullerton is better off for the deficit spending it is a damn fool.
How can you go from plus 8 mil to in the red in a couple years. Can City Hall projection numbers even be trusted as remotely accurate?
In any case there’s no way these people can be trusted to fix this. Zahra will try another Measure S/Domer Tax. It worked out so well last time.
Easy, by giving us 20% raises in exchange for no longer whining about going to OCFA.
That way we only get the best of the best!
Get ready to start bailing, Fred.
This is the first squishy trial balloon. Levitt doesn’t mention taxes. But he will. It’s already on a white board in City Hall somewhere.
Haha. Dr. Shana wants to move people into the vacant buildings on Placentia that are driving her “nuts.”
It’s a short drive, Doc. Where are these places, exactly, and how on earth does this pertain to a budget crash?
Just keep your mouth closed and do yourself a favor.
Economic development is code for praying to Allah for rain. Ahmad uses it to mask the fact he has no plan and no clue. So he uses fancy words and speaks with his fancy accent to fool the morons in his district and all the dummies with white guilt to dance to his tune. Exposing his lies has been 4Fs mission. Too bad voters in his district can’t seem to see through the Ahmad bull.
He isn’t a Muslim. There’s no gay in the Koran.
Zahra is an unemployed physician/film maker/business owner. His knowledge of economic development could be written on a piece of confetti.
I had to laugh when I read that stupid statement about the municipal employees being the “life blood” of the city. Reminded me of tipsy Flory claiming the department heads were the “heart” of the city. Can these people really be that dense?
I thought I was the life blood of the city. Guess not.
You might be. Are you the parks and Rec knucklehead?
You can blame Jung for this round of red ink. He took over negotiations with the fire heroes and pushed hard for massive raises for them. Absolutely no way to pay for any of it. That’s why you’re seeing the steep drop in revenue forecasted over the next few years. The strategy there is to create a fiscal calamity so the public has no option but to vote yes on a sales tax increase. Expect to see the fire union goons out in force twisting arms to make sure the tax passes so they can keep their pay raises and keep up the payments on their vacation homes, RVs, boats, and child support.
Don’t forget the cops. Ex-wife #2 needs her alimony.
That’s pretty unlikely. It’s Zahra and Charles who are under the fire union thumb – and show it at every opportunity.
Fullerton will never change for the better. The writing has been on the wall for decades, and the rubber hits the Fullerton pothole roads yet again.
Get out now while you still might have a property value or life to protect!
Fullerton is now, no place to live, raise a family or invest in business. It lost all that charm and civility decades ago. Now the pension funds of the “life blood” police/fire employees have drained the city dry. When over 75% of a city’s budget is in pension, you are screwed. For a loooooonnnnng time!
When someone like George crumb retires as a police officer you know life is completely upside down. The stories I could tell.
Safe yourself now and find a city where it functions like a real city should. Fullerton doesn’t give two shits about you.
Or when the City celebrates the departure of a known pedophile.
Heroes deserve. Public safety unions are, for all practical purposes, syndicated, organized crime families.
They don’t care if it bankrupts the city as long as they get their big diesel trucks, sand toys, boats and home in AZ/NV/UT where they can play. In their minds, taxpayers are just slaves to extract ever more wealth from for themselves.
I don’t know the details of next fiscal year’s budget that is coming up soon, but I wonder if the City isn’t using some of this year’s surplus to keep the City in the black in 23-24. If that’s true, then the fiscal cliff is even worse than the graph shows.
I guess we could ask the Mayor.
The devil is in the details but I believe your assumption is correct – we’ll have to wait to see the final budget document and debate from the City Council but I’m certain they will tap reserves this year to plug the budget gap so yes, the City’s finances are worse than they’re letting on.
“and debate from the City Council”
Debate? It will be chatter and theater. None of those 5 nincompoops can analyze a budget.
I can chatter with the best of them. I can blather like the wind and verbally diarrhea All over your lap. I pout whilst preening and mugging for my hags in the audience. For I am Zahra, the most interesting and talented douche nozzle in the world.