In his State of the City address, Mayor Todd Gloria said that 2025 will be a year of “steep” spending cuts in San Diego.
The cuts aren’t a surprise. The city is staring down a $250 million plus deficit. Gloria said he had hoped the sales tax increase on November’s ballot, Measure E, would have given the city the money it needs to expand services. But Measure E didn’t pass and the city is now headed toward an era of austerity.
Gloria made all the mandatory promises for a politician forced to make spending cuts. City officials will continue to roll out new initiatives. They’ll get creative with the money. They’ll right size.
Notably absent: The mayor did not mention his proposed mega-shelter in Middletown. The proposal has faced a series of roadblocks and it seems quite possible, if not likely, the project won’t move forward. Gloria, nonetheless, promised to expand shelter options in 2025.
Gloria called on the county to respond more urgently to the region’s behavioral health crisis and argued the county did little to prepare for the implementation of a state conservatorship expansion law it delayed for a year. He also criticized other San Diego County cities for not prioritizing homelessness solutions, a decision he said came at the expense of city taxpayers.
“My fellow San Diegans, it is my hope that any time you see a person on the street suffering from extreme mental illness or addiction, you think of the county of San Diego and ask, ‘When will they step up to provide the services they need to end this crisis once and for all,’” he said.
County Supervisor Monica Montgomery Steppe, who was in the audience Wednesday, didn’t love that.
Her reaction: Montgomery Steppe told Voice she supports calls for the county to do more but said Gloria engaged in “blame shifting” that creates tension and doesn’t help those in need.
“Frankly, the mayor has not, in my opinion, done his due diligence to even reach out to my office to help navigate some of the issues that he talked about or get the facts about what he’s talking about because I heard a lot of things that were misleading,” Montgomery Steppe said.
For example, Montgomery Steppe said, the county was one of the first counties in the state to proceed despite supervisors’ decision to postpone implementation for a year. She said the county used the past year to train police on the new policy to protect San Diegans’ civil liberties, prepare the health system and increase the number of teams that respond to people in crisis.
Gloria previously told Voice he was frustrated that the county hadn’t added more treatment beds before SB 43 took effect earlier this month.
Speaking of beds: Montgomery Steppe on Wednesday announced her proposal for the county to start talks to add up to 30 new behavioral health inpatient beds at Paradise Valley Hospital, expand outpatient treatment options for people with Medi-Cal insurance, bolster long-term housing options for people with behavioral health conditions and expand behavioral health workforce training.
“I think it’s very important for the public to know what we are continually working on in this office, not as a reactionary approach to the mayor’s office or anyone else, but as a consistent and sustained approach of how we are going to solve the issues, which is what the people elected me to do in this position,” Montgomery Steppe said.
Other reactions: Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera released a statement saying he agreed with some of Gloria’s major points. But he was disheartened by what he didn’t hear.
“I didn’t hear enough about how this administration plans to work with City Council to make San Diego work for everyday San Diegans,” Elo-Rivera’s statement read. “San Diego families are struggling to afford rent, childcare, and groceries. Meanwhile, our city workers are being asked to carry the weight of a budget crisis they didn’t cause. And tourists—who enjoy the beauty of our beaches, parks, and neighborhoods—still aren’t being asked to pay their fair share.”