{"id":141802,"date":"2026-01-20T17:46:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T17:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/141802\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T17:46:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T17:46:07","slug":"santa-clara-county-to-face-budget-effects-in-2026-due-to-federal-funding-cuts-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/141802\/","title":{"rendered":"Santa Clara County to face budget effects in 2026 due to federal funding cuts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Santa Clara County Executive James Williams sums up the biggest issue facing California\u2019s sixth-largest county in 2026 in three words: \u201cbudget, budget, budget.\u201d<\/p>\n

The past year ushered in a new age of fiscal challenges for the county as President Donald Trump and a Republican-controlled Congress passed legislation last summer that triggered\u00a0unprecedented cuts to the federal Medicaid program. Known as Medi-Cal in California, the program provides health insurance to low-income and disabled individuals.<\/p>\n

As the operators of the second-largest county health and hospital system in the state, Trump\u2019s landmark tax-and-spending bill has left a giant hole in Santa Clara County\u2019s growing budget for the coming years.<\/p>\n

2025 saw the county act swiftly to respond to the challenge, placing a general sales tax increase on the November ballot to backfill a portion of the lost revenues, which make up roughly a third of the budget. Voters ultimately approved the sales tax increase<\/a>, which will take effect in April. But the projected $330 million it will raise annually will only plug part of the $1 billion annual gap, placing budget challenges \u2014 and health care \u2014 at the forefront of the county\u2019s priorities.<\/p>\n

Williams said in an interview that budget constraints will \u201ctremendously\u201d impact policy decisions the Board of Supervisors might want to pursue this year to ensure that baseline services are preserved. In addition to the fiscal challenges stemming from the federal government\u2019s actions, the county is also impacted by \u201can extraordinary set of policy challenges\u201d as well, according to Williams.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe combination of the two consumes a tremendous amount of our energy because we have a duty to take care of those most in need in our community and to do everything that we can that\u2019s within our control to help ensure that Santa Clara County residents continue to have access to critical services and that Santa Clara County residents continued to be cared for,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The county executive said they plan on innovating locally, advocating for more funding from the state and pursuing litigation where necessary. The county sued the Trump administration nine times in 2025 on a range of executive orders, such as the president\u2019s attempts to revoke birthright citizenship to pulling federal funding from local governments that have deemed themselves as \u201csanctuaries\u201d for immigrants living in the country illegally.<\/p>\n

Supervisor Otto Lee, who is the president of the Board of Supervisors, said in an interview its lawsuits against the federal government are critical to protecting both residents\u2019 rights and key funding streams.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s one of those things in life that we just have to continue pressing on to make sure that we can sustain our work as a county,\u201d he said. \u201cWithout the federal funds, without the state funds, we are not able to do our main core job.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the budget will dictate many of the county\u2019s policy actions in 2026, Lee \u2014 who will be serving as president of the board for the second year \u2014 said he would like the county to focus more on emergency preparedness, working more deeply with San Jose officials to tackle the unsheltered homeless crisis and ensuring schools have clean drinking water.<\/p>\n

Supervisors Sylvia Arenas, who serves as the vice president of the board, said her priorities focus on \u201cbuilding on the momentum of the Latino Health Assessment.\u201d The county released the detailed report last year,<\/a> which found that while Latinos, who make up one in four residents in the county, often face worse health outcomes than their white and Asian counterparts.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a real opportunity to turn data into action by addressing persistent social determinants that has led to Latinos having a two-year shorter life expectancy than their counterparts,\u201d Arenas said in a statement. \u201cIncreasing health access this year is vital as we face the realities of H.R. 1 and support the growing number of families relying on the county\u2019s safety\u2011net programs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some of the county\u2019s policy work in the upcoming year, however, may depend on what kind of funding it receives from the state. Gov. Gavin Newsom released his annual budget proposal earlier this month that aims to close a projected $2.9 billion shortfall, which doesn\u2019t seem promising for the county\u2019s fiscal challenges.<\/p>\n

Williams called the initial proposal a \u201cstatus quo budget,\u201d saying that it is \u201cbasically \u00a0non-responsive to the attack that H.R. 1 has brought on Californians.\u201d<\/p>\n

The county executive said the proposal \u201cdumps the burden\u201d of the Medicaid cuts onto California\u2019s 58 counties.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the things that was disappointing about the governor\u2019s initial budget proposal is there was nothing in there to respond to the devastating impacts on our public hospital systems across the state,\u201d Williams said. \u201cIt is absolutely incumbent on the legislature and the state government to step up and ensure that all Californians retain access to these critical services.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Santa Clara County Executive James Williams sums up the biggest issue facing California\u2019s sixth-largest county in 2026 in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":141803,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[184,7,8,185,186,457,187,1280,181,23,205,188,189,190,191,192,193,194,100,195,13,88,90,89,197,198,14368,199,200,203],"class_list":["post-141802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-bay-area","tag-california","tag-california-news","tag-campbell","tag-cupertino","tag-gavin-newsom","tag-gilroy","tag-health-care","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-local-politics","tag-los-altos","tag-los-altos-hills","tag-los-gatos","tag-milpitas","tag-monte-sereno","tag-morgan-hill","tag-mountain-view","tag-news","tag-palo-alto","tag-politics","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-santa-clara","tag-santa-clara-county","tag-santa-clara-county-politics","tag-saratoga","tag-south-bay","tag-sunnyvale"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141802","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=141802"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141802\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/141803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=141802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=141802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}