San Diego City Council this morning voted unanimously to override Mayor Jerry Sanders’ veto of the budget resolution it passed last week, but also agreed to a compromise worked out between the mayor and Councilwoman Donna Frye on the midyear budget cuts.
The vote put to rest weeks of wrangling between mayor and council over tens of millions of dollars in budget cuts needed to close a $43 million midyear deficit. The new council, with four new members set to be sworn in Monday, is scheduled to issue a final vote the following day.
The vote on Tuesday will include most of the cuts Sanders had originally proposed, but will not include Sanders’ proposals to close seven libraries and nine recreation centers, and eliminate two fire crews from the city’s daily rotation. Council had rejected those cuts when it issued its first vote on Sanders’ package of cuts on Nov. 24.
Then on Monday, on the second reading of the resolution passed on Nov. 24, council voted to add six community service centers and three painter positions from the facilities department to the items it was saving from Sanders’ budget ax. The total cost of those items is $600,000.
Sanders cried foul, saying council violated the city charter by adding those items after the original resolution passed. On Wednesday he vetoed council’s first vote on the budget. But over the past couple of days Sanders and Frye hammered out an agreement whereby the community centers will be closed, but not until the end of January, and the painter positions will be cut, but then added back through a budget amendment in January.