Delano council approves biannual $121.5 million budget, directs online posting

Delano City Council on June 16, 2025, approved a biannual operating and capital improvement budget covering fiscal years 2025–26 and 2026–27, the council announced at a special meeting. The resolution passed by voice and roll call with four affirmative votes and two members absent.

The budget totals roughly $121.5 million in resources in the first year and $112.8 million in the second, according to the staff presentation. It includes a general fund of about $35.4 million in year one ($36.7 million in year two), enterprise funds of about $33.4 million and other funds totaling roughly $52.7 million. The proposal lists projects and priorities such as water and sewer line replacements, police vehicle purchases, road and traffic-signal projects, park rehabilitation, the transit maintenance and training facility, water meter installations and completion of the general plan update and recreation master plan.

The budget hearing and presentation were led by Ms. Rios, a staff member who presented financial highlights and said, “In conclusion, the budget is balanced,” while urging continued financial vigilance given economic uncertainty. The presentation detailed long-term fiscal challenges including rising health-care and pension costs, workforce turnover, expiring local sales-tax measures, aging facilities and infrastructure, and uncertain grant revenues.

Council members discussed the pressure on the city’s enterprise funds, particularly the utility/water-production fund, where expenses exceeded revenues in recent audited years. One council member asked whether revenue from a proposed local sales-tax measure (referred to in discussion as “Measure Y”) could be used to help enterprise funds. Ms. Rios said that reallocating general-fund resources to enterprise funds if the measure passes is “certainly something that I have every intention” of proposing to the full council, and that council could consider directing such funding to relieve utility-billing pressures.

The budget as presented includes two personnel changes: creation of a recreation coordinator position and reclassification of a part-time transit driver to full time. Capital improvements and outlay items listed in the proposal include well rehabilitations, police vehicle procurement, network infrastructure upgrades, the transit facility, Voice of America infrastructure development, upgraded public-safety technology, and rehabilitation of the new Civic Center Methodist Church project.

Following presentation and brief council remarks thanking staff, a motion to approve the budget was made and passed. Ms. Rios confirmed the approved document will be published online: “Once we approve it tonight, we will make it available to the public online.” The meeting adjourned at about 5:47 p.m.

Discussion items that did not constitute formal limitations or binding reallocations included council interest in using sales-tax measure proceeds to support enterprise funds and reminders that many listed revenues are grant-dependent and therefore uncertain; no additional binding direction beyond approving the budget resolution was recorded in the transcript.