Mid-year City of Menifee budget adjustment adds $2 million

By Doug Spoon, Editor

Higher than expected tax revenue and savings from unfilled budgeted staff positions has resulted in a $2 million increase to the City of Menifee's general fund for the 2019-20 fiscal year.

The Menifee City Council on Wednesday approved an adjustment in the budget and subsequent expenses to fill some staff positions and purchase equipment. The action was part of the City's mid-year budget review, presented by Deputy City Manager Rochelle Clayton and and Deputy Finance Director Wendy Preece.

Clayton told council members that the increased revenue over budget projections totaled $1.175 million, resulting from an increase of $1.1 million in sales tax revenue (including Measure DD funds), $95,000 in developer fees revenue, and $211,000 in property tax revenue. The total saved from unfilled staff positions was approximately $845,000.

The City's original balanced budget for the current fiscal year totaled $60.9 million.

Out of the $2 million in additional revenue, the City Council approved staff's request for $734,624 in expenditures to fund staff positions, purchase IT equipment, and purchase radios and other equipment for the Code Enforcement Department. Subtracting that amount from the $2 million additional revenue, the net amount added to the budget is approximately $1.285 million.

The budget adjustment included the creation of eight new staff positions. Six of those have been identified as a senior engineer of land development; a senior public works inspector; a financial analyst; a purchasing and contract specialist; and two IT technicians. In addition, six current positions have been re-classified, moving some part-time positions to full-time.

When all positions are filled, City of Menifee staff will total 223, Clayton said. She stated that this compares favorably with a city of similar size such as Murrieta, which has 286 staff positions. Murrieta's population is 114,985. Menifee's rapidly growing population has increased to 92,595.

City Manager Armando Villa defended the large number of additional budgeted positions in recent years and explained why some of those have remained unfilled.

"We wanted to take a conservative approach in how we added staff," Villa said. "In the last few years, staff went from 40 to 60 to 100 and now over 200. I don't want the public to think we've done a bad job of budgeting. We phased in staff based on the revenue each year."

In response to a question from Mayor Pro Tem Matt Liesemeyer about the unfilled positions, Villa said, "We've studied that. A few hires backed out because they received higher offers from their current employer. Cities are in a hiring war right now."

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