West Palm Beach CRA unveils draft FY2026–27 budgets, schedules final adoption for Sept. 14

Chris Ruge, executive director of the West Palm Beach Community Redevelopment Agency, presented the CRA’s draft fiscal year 2026–27 budgets and the agency’s strategic finance plan at the Aug. 3 board meeting. The plan frames CRA activity under state statute and sets the items the CRA can fund; Ruge told the board the document is the basis for staff spending and that the commission’s feedback will be incorporated before a final vote on Sept. 14.

Ruge described the budget process as driven by three inputs: existing projects the board has previously approved, department requests, and community input gathered through CRA meetings, city commission meetings, surveys and one-on-one engagement. He said the CRAs rely on incremental property-tax revenues (tax increment financing) from city and county millage and that only the increment above the original base value can be used for CRA projects. "If it's not in the plan, we can't do it," Ruge said, summarizing why the strategic finance plan matters for future spending.

Ira Gonzales, the CRA’s fiscal services manager, provided the numerical details for the smaller Northwood–Pleasant City CRA: total revenues and expenses of $9,785,000, including $968,000 in carryforward, $5.5 million in city tax-increment revenue and $3,000,083 from Palm Beach County. He said target-area initiatives make up $6.3 million of that budget and that innovative policing accounts for $800,000 within operations. Gonzales also reviewed the downtown fund’s revenue picture and line-item breakdown after staff finished the district-by-district summaries.

The board posed several procedural questions about outreach and line-item allocations and asked staff to provide additional detail where needed. Ruge said staff would make adjustments requested by the board and return with the final adoption package on Sept. 14.