A\u00a0preliminary outlook on Phoenix\u2019s short-term and long-term fiscal future provoked an attack on police spending from a City Council member.<\/p>\n
Picking up where she left off last year \u2013 when she cast the sole vote against the city\u2019s 2025-26 budget \u2013 South Phoenix Councilwoman Anna Hernandez vowed to press again for deep cuts in the $1 billion Police Department budget.<\/p>\n
\u201cPPD gets so much of the General Fund \u2013 it gets the majority of our General Fund. And ultimately, this is an investment in criminalization, which means that criminalization is the single biggest investment this city makes every year,\u201d said Hernandez.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd, you know, the way we see it is that criminalization does not create safety, so we spend all this money and don\u2019t, ultimately, just get the actual results we want.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hernandez, whose young brother was fatally shot by a Phoenix officer in 2019 while he was having a mental illness crisis, said police spending diverts money from an array of other services.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt costs other programs and costs other opportunities for investment in our communities, investments we could be doing into harm reduction, violence prevention programs, mediation centers, experienced de-escalator mediators and facilitators, increased de-escalation skills and foster relationships among community members to support friends, family and community experiencing unmet mental health needs, domestic and sexual violence.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe could be increasing our investments in human services and parks and libraries to subsidize where we have lost federal or state grants.\u201d<\/p>\n
She said the Police Department has\u00a0 66 programs\u00a0 \u201cwhile most other departments average less than 10 programs.\u201d<\/p>\n
She ticked off several recent increases in police-related spending, including: $4.3 million for the Streets Enforcement Unit, $7 million for audits and inspections, $4 million for patrol, $7 million for impound property and evidence, $5 million for public transit policing, $16 million for aviation patrol and a a new Field Investigation Unit program totaling $3.6 million.<\/p>\n
She did not mention the nearly 600 empty patrol positions for which funding has been allocated.<\/p>\n
Councilwomen Kesha Hodge Washington and Betty Guardado, as well as Mayor Kate Gallego also commented after City Manager Ed Zuercher presented his fiscal outlook a he prepares to release his Trial Budget for the 2026-27 fiscal year later this month.<\/p>\n
But none of them voiced any comment on police spending, instead referencing other parts of Zuercher\u2019s presentation.<\/p>\n
In that presentation, Zuercher said a combination of factors driven primarily by increases last year in the city\u2019s Transactional Privilege Tax and Use Tax have created a $62 million surplus for the fiscal year beginning July 1.<\/p>\n
Zuercher said\u00a0 General Fund spending will grow by 3.4% over the current fiscal year and outlined numerous challenges and uncertainties facing budget planners.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
One of the landmines in the city\u2019s future fiscal picture is rising pension costs, especially for firefighters and police.<\/p>\n
(City of Phoenix)<\/p>\n
He noted the economy is growing but volatile, indicating that sales tax growth weakened during the first six months of the current fiscal year.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you see volatility, that gives you some pause,\u201d he said, noting uncertainty tied to federal monetary policy, state legislative actions and local affordability pressures.<\/p>\n
He said several state legislative proposals could significantly affect Phoenix finances, including one capping city sales tax rates unless approved by voters. That could cost an estimated $87 million annually, he said.<\/p>\n
A separate measure could withhold $333 million in state-shared revenue over three years to compensate property owners for zoning-related impacts.<\/p>\n
He also said proposed changes to pension benefits could increase city contribution costs.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Additionally, potential state \u201ctax conformity\u201d with recent federal tax changes could reduce Phoenix\u2019s state-shared income tax revenue by $12.5 million to $21 million beginning in fiscal year 2027\u201328.<\/p>\n
Zuercher explained that changes in federal tax treatment of overtime, tips and other income categories may require state adjustments that would affect local distributions.<\/p>\n
Zuercher stressed the importance of maintaining a structurally balanced budget in future years, noting that expenditures are projected to outpace revenues in 2027\u201328 without the set-aside\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hodge Washington pointed to weakening sales tax growth and broader market volatility.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you layer this with what we\u2019re seeing\u2026 whether or not it\u2019s tariffs or stock market, we generally see a level of uncertainty that gives us some concern,\u201d she said, asking whether projections were sufficiently conservative\u00a0<\/p>\n
She also emphasized affordability concerns and suggested exploring ways to soften the impact of fees on seniors and residents on fixed incomes.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we have a surplus, we should see how we can maximize this impact,\u201d she said, balancing \u201ccompassion and fiscal responsibility.\u201d<\/p>\n
Guardado focused on employee retention and compensation.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I first came into office, we saw the turnover,\u201d she said. \u201cWe were losing people to other cities because of wages.\u201d<\/p>\n
She warned against \u201cfalling back to where we were at in 2019,\u201d noting that maintaining competitive pay for city workers, firefighters and public safety personnel remains critical\u00a0<\/p>\n
Gallego said, \u201cI am a supporter of our employees and staying competitive and being able to compete with other cities \u2014 that would be one of my top priorities.\u201d<\/p>\n
She also signaled interest in funding for the city\u2019s Office of Refugee and Immigration Support, citing recent reductions in federal benefits for refugee populations.<\/p>\n
The mayor also raised concerns about generous tax subsidies for data centers, arguing they should \u201cpay their fair share,\u201d particularly given public safety impacts. \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A\u00a0preliminary outlook on Phoenix\u2019s short-term and long-term fiscal future provoked an attack on police spending from a City…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":640746,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5131],"tags":[5229,123376,5643,1587,132986,126758,132988,153913,1589,78288,123374,11311,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-640745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-phoenix","tag-america","tag-anna-hernandez","tag-arizona","tag-az","tag-betty-guardado","tag-ed-zuercher","tag-kesha-hodge-washington","tag-mayor-kate-gallego","tag-phoenix","tag-phoenix-city-council","tag-phoenix-general-fund","tag-phoenix-police-department","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=640745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640745\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/640746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=640745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=640745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=640745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}