{"id":226714,"date":"2026-03-19T09:19:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T09:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/226714\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T09:19:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T09:19:09","slug":"berkeley-city-council-takes-next-steps-toward-300m-bond-for-infrastructure-city-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/226714\/","title":{"rendered":"Berkeley City Council takes next steps toward $300M bond for infrastructure | City Government"},"content":{"rendered":"

Berkeley City Council members unanimously voted to draft ballot language for a proposed<\/a> $300 million bond measure and 0.5% increase in sales tax at its special meeting Tuesday. The measures will appear on the ballot for the November 2026 election.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The bond measure will go toward priority infrastructure investments, while the sales tax will go toward the city\u2019s projected General Fund deficit of $27 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It is currently estimated that Berkeley\u2019s long-term infrastructure needs will exceed $1.5 billion, according to the agenda.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While the bond measure will not fully address this need, it will work towards \u201cstabilizing and modernizing critical civic infrastructure,\u201d according to the agenda.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe longer we defer the maintenance on all these projects, the more expensive they become,\u201d said City Manager Paul Buddenhagen. \u201cThere is a cost efficiency and a benefit to addressing them earlier rather than later.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the meeting, David Mermin, a pollster from Lake Research Partners, presented survey results gauging voter priorities and support for the bond and proposed increase in sales tax. The survey polled 500 people, which was meant to be a representative sample of voters in the upcoming election.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Both ballot measures are in a \u201cgood position\u201d to pass in the election, according to the survey. However, several public commenters criticized the polling sample size, stating that it did not represent the entire community\u2019s priorities.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the survey, participants also expressed their highest priorities for infrastructure improvement projects. Results indicated that the greatest demands were for climate resilience infrastructure, sidewalk and accessibility improvements, and stormwater upgrades.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOur central concern is the structure of the proposed bond,\u201d said a representative for the Commission on Disability during public comment. \u201cAccessibility is at risk to be fully acknowledged in principle, but underfunded in practice. In the proposed funding structure, accessibility appears inside the broad category that addresses critical infrastructure and accessibility.\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

District 3 Councilmember Ben Bartlett additionally suggested this year\u2019s ballot climate as a non-presidential election year may skew the demographics of the poll to be older, creating high demand for sidewalk repairs and other issues impacting older constituents.<\/p>\n

Public commenters also expressed widespread support for projects improving the infrastructure of historic buildings in Downtown, including seismic retrofitting of the Old City Hall.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the things that we really do pass on is our art and our history and our culture,\u201d said Loni Hancock, former Berkeley mayor and member of the California State Senate. \u201cThese buildings signify that in Berkeley. It\u2019s wonderful that the council will hopefully have it on the ballot, and then we will go out and try to leverage additional money.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Berkeley City Council members unanimously voted to draft ballot language for a proposed $300 million bond measure and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":226715,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[35029,7981,44501,103177,103175,103176,103178,143,145,144],"class_list":["post-226714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-ben-bartlett","tag-berkeley-city-council","tag-california-state-senate","tag-commission-on-disability","tag-david-mermin","tag-lake-research-partners","tag-loni-hancock","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226714","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=226714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226714\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/226715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=226714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=226714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=226714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}