June 1, 2006

County executive recommends 2007 budget

By Supervisor Jim Beall
Special to the Times

On May 2, Santa Clara County Executive Pete Kutras provided the Board of Supervisors and the general public his recommended budget for fiscal year 2007. The county budget he recommended includes a projected $164.6 million deficit and confirms that Santa Clara County is in a tough and frightening financial situation. 

The budget leaves gapping holes in our already tattered safety net despite our hope that the slowly recovering economy would have provided some financial relief by now.

The state and federal governments continue to pile on new mandates while cutting back funding to our most basic community needs. It may leave us no alternative but to balance the budget at the expense of essential services including public safety and public health.

Somehow, we need to maintain public safety, operate the community’s jails, maintain expressways, provide safety-net services and prevent ongoing and looming threats to our public health. The people of Santa Clara County desperately need us to keep the county hospital and community clinics open, yet this will be difficult if we don’t find financial relief.

Our county has been struggling financially for five years. We have barely maintained critical services by using our depleting reserves. The sobering fact is that we have survived until now by using up our savings.

The county executive’s budget message and recommended budget are available on the county’s main Web site: www.sccgov.org.