Santa Barbara finance committee reviews draft FY2026 downtown parking and downtown services budget

The Santa Barbara City Finance Committee on April 15 reviewed a draft fiscal year 2026 downtown parking and downtown services budget and discussed a set of operational “tune ups” staff say will reduce a projected shortfall without raising rates.

Staff said the downtown parking enterprise fund has been underfunded for years and that the city will propose moving several non-parking costs into a new downtown services program supported by the general fund. Sarah Clark, downtown parking staff, told the committee “our system is underfunded and it has been for many years,” and described revenue, service and capital gaps that she said left the fund with multi-year deficits and drawn-down reserves.

The proposal is intended to be a two-phase approach. Phase 1, for FY2026, would pause most capital spending, complete an updated facilities assessment, and pilot operational changes. Phase 2 will address FY2027 and later after the facilities assessment is complete.

Clark said hourly customers supply roughly two-thirds of parking revenue and monthly permits the next largest share, while a business-value estimate used by staff values downtown parking services at about $24 million annually against roughly $10 million in revenue. She said subsidizing the courtesy period costs the city about $6 million a year and that downtown occupancy has fallen “about 20%” since the pandemic, factors that contributed to multi-year deficits.

To narrow an estimated FY2026 shortfall,…