{"id":375612,"date":"2026-06-26T08:43:17","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T08:43:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/375612\/"},"modified":"2026-06-26T08:43:17","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T08:43:17","slug":"devastating-city-council-sweepingly-cuts-public-safety-houselessness-services-and-city-staff-to-close-30m-deficit-city","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/375612\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Devastating\u2019: City Council sweepingly cuts public safety, houselessness services and city staff to close $30M deficit | City"},"content":{"rendered":"

Capping off a season of austerity deliberations, the city of Berkeley adopted<\/a> a severe budget Tuesday night, which will cut almost every area of its services to close a $30 million deficit.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The council unanimously adopted the budget, the final details of which were ironed out at the end of the night, and which came out of a compromise between conflicting visions of key details of the city\u2019s finances.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis work is not complete tonight,\u201d said District 5 Councilmember Shoshana O\u2019Keefe. \u201cThis work, what we\u2019re doing right now tonight, this is the best thing to do right now, but this work is not done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Among the most potent points of public contention, the city agreed to deep cuts to public safety, approving a budget that may shutter<\/a> Fire Station 4 in fiscal year 2028, and which includes layoffs for fire and police<\/a> department employees, among other city positions. The city also enacted<\/a> sweeping cuts to services for its residents who are unhoused.<\/p>\n

That final vote came down to an 11th-hour battle between amendments proposed by District 1 Councilmember Rashi Kesarwani and Mayor Adena Ishii over how best to support affordable housing and whether the city could preserve more fire department positions amid its austerity measures.<\/p>\n

Kesarwani\u2019s amendment, which galvanized public comment and council discussions around the city\u2019s Small Sites Program, or SSP, throughout the night, sought to reallocate $3.8 million proposed by the mayor for SSP toward new affordable housing developments and also proposed to make further use of one-time General Fund allocations and other revenues to preserve nine fire department positions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The SSP is provided through the city\u2019s Housing Trust Fund and supports the renovation of small multifamily properties into affordable housing. The money within the SSP currently totals $2.5 million and cannot be allocated to parts of the budget outside of the Housing Trust Fund.<\/p>\n

Affordable housing efforts are historically broadly supported by Berkeley voters, 74% of whom passed ballot Measure U1, which was put forward in 2016 to provide funds for affordable housing.<\/p>\n

While community members celebrated Kesarwani\u2019s preservation of Berkeley Fire Department staff Tuesday night, public comment saw dozens rail against her gouging of SSP funding.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you ask tenants where they want to live in Berkeley, they will always say the land trust,\u201d said District 2 resident Leah Simon-Weisberg. \u201cThe community of Berkeley lives there. Please do not think that you are protecting tenants because the tenants are saying fund this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kesarwani maintained that the city would be better off putting money toward new housing developments, which she claimed could leverage state and federal funds to maximize the impact of the city\u2019s investment, instead of the preservative efforts supported by SSP.<\/p>\n

A measure pushed to the statewide November ballot by legislators Monday would, if voters approve it, funnel $11.25 billion toward affordable housing programs, possibly including the SSP.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ishii\u2019s amendments did not initially include Kesarwani\u2019s efforts to preserve nine fire department positions. However, staring down about 30 fire department employees in the crowd and widespread support in public comment, Ishii ultimately struck a compromise and adopted measures to preserve fire department positions in her budgetary vision.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kesarwani also tried to compromise, lessening her reallocation of SSP funds to $1.3 million. In the end, it proved too little.<\/p>\n

The council rejected Kesarwani\u2019s amendments in favor of Ishii\u2019s. District 2 Councilmember Terry Taplin and District 6 Councilmember Brent Blackaby voted with Kesarwani for her amendment, with District 8 Councilmember Mark Humbert abstaining.<\/p>\n

Kesarwani, who has served eight years on the council, remained strident throughout the night about the necessity of her proposed austerity measures.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI have never been fiscally irresponsible in my time on the council,\u201d Kesarwani said in her initial presentation to her colleagues.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Service Employees International Union Local 1021 East Bay field director Peter Masiak, however, said he was disappointed by the adopted budget, which did not prevent all city job losses.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s devastating for the people who rely on services as well because the positions are largely in sort of public health, so these people who do mobile crisis, who work with people with mental health issues,\u201d Masiak said. \u201cPeople are going to lose jobs, but also those services are not going to get provided.\u201d<\/p>\n

A number of city jobs were still cut in the budget, although city officials have said they are working to find employment for those affected by layoffs in other city positions.<\/p>\n

Regardless, the accord struck in Tuesday night\u2019s compromise resolves many of the city\u2019s immediate budget concerns, closing a $30 million deficit at a staggering cost. But this leaves the city to contend with still-looming financial uncertainty.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The city is still banking its financial health on the success of two ballot measures forwarded<\/a> by the council to voters in the coming elections June 16. One, a 0.5% sales tax measure, would require<\/a> a simple majority to pass, while the other, an infrastructure bond<\/a>, would require a two-thirds vote.<\/p>\n

According to Ishii, the council will hold a meeting early next year to reevaluate the budget in light of local and state ballot results.<\/p>\n

The budget will take effect July 1.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Capping off a season of austerity deliberations, the city of Berkeley adopted a severe budget Tuesday night, which…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375613,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[7983,20588,32259,11057,47052,107581,152159,12500,145697,143,145,144,152160,12499,47311,7987,152158,12498],"class_list":["post-375612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-adena-ishii","tag-brent-blackaby","tag-city-of-berkeley","tag-fire-department","tag-fire-station-4","tag-housing-trust-fund","tag-leah-simon-weisberg","tag-mark-humbert","tag-measure-u1","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news","tag-peter-masiak","tag-rashi-kesarwani","tag-seiu-1021","tag-shoshana-okeefe","tag-small-sites","tag-terry-taplin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375612","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=375612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}