Tempe staff previews nearly $2 billion in project requests in five‑year capital plan
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Summary
City staff introduced a draft five‑year capital improvement program (CIP) that lists nearly $2 billion in department project requests and is being presented for review and public input; no council action was requested at this session.
City of Tempe staff on Feb. 24 presented an initial, informational overview of the city’s five‑year Capital Improvement Program, showing departments requested nearly $2,000,000,000 in projects and asking the council for input, not approval.
The presentation gave council members and the public a high‑level navigation guide to the CIP document — including program summaries, funding‑source breakdowns and direct links to detailed project pages — and made clear the item is a planning document with only the first year adopted later in the budget process.
Julie Heider, the city’s interim budget director, and Lisette Camacho, deputy city manager, led the briefing and emphasized the introduction is meant to inform council and residents rather than to obtain direction. “We are not looking for council direction at this time,” Heider said. Staff noted department directors are available for project‑specific questions and that the CIP and operating budget processes will be reconciled at the April 24 budget review session.
The CIP packet in the agenda materials includes a table of contents with bookmarks to 13 program summaries and by‑project pages that list project descriptions, council priorities, budgets, funding sources and projected operating impacts. As an example during the demonstration, staff navigated from the police program summary to a “new police substation” project detail page to illustrate the document structure.
Staff said the CIP results from months of departmental work and internal coordination by budget staff, listing Kevin D. Domenico, Carrie Taylor and Benicia Benson among those credited. The presentation also outlined the public outreach plan: an online public survey open through Feb. 28 that lets residents allocate hypothetical $100 across programs, public budget forums (including a Feb. 4 session), targeted meetings with advisory groups and continual information through the city website, social media and mailings.
Calendar milestones provided to the council include a March 20 session with the initial recommended CIP and acceleration models for focus areas, budget review sessions in April and May, tentative budget adoption May 22, final adoption June 5 and property tax levy adoption on July 1.
Staff reiterated that only the first year of the CIP is adopted and that the document is intended to provide transparency and allow council and residents to see department capital needs in advance of formal budget decisions. The council offered no immediate questions and the item moved on to the long‑range forecast presentation.
The CIP document and related project pages are posted with the Feb. 24 agenda packet on the city website.
