By Robert Haugh
Last night, the Santa Clara City Council approved the City’s budget for Fiscal Years 2025/26 and 2026/27.
The overall budget includes Silicon Valley Power (SVP). In fact, SVP accounts for approximately 70 percent of municipal spending.
The next three major categories are:
- Other Departments (12%)
- Public Works (10%)
- Police and Fire (8%)
Here are the budgeted expenditures by category:
It’s time we pull back the curtain on the anonymous blogger hiding behind the initials “CSC” on Santa Clara News Online and other publications. His real name is Josh Stevens, and he is a paid employee for the SF49ers.
His relentless attacks on the City of Santa Clara – especially our SC Police Department – aren’t about journalism or civic concern; they’re about protecting the 49ers’ bottom line. Stevens is using a local platform to push the team’s private agenda, including efforts to avoid paying their fair share for public safety and city services.
The residents of Santa Clara deserve transparency, not anonymous propaganda from someone who profits off undermining our community. Let’s call it what it is: a coordinated effort to misuse city resources for private gain, and it’s long past time the public knows who’s really behind it!
Reading many negative comments by CSC on social media you definitely have to consider the source. The 49ers. Big surprise. Thank you for exposing the source Michael DeFranco and Adam. In the current turbulent times, this rhetoric just adds to the division.
Readers should first have an overview of both the Operating Budgets and Revenue Models for the cities of Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, and San Jose.
• San Jose: https://www.sanjoseca.gov/home/showpublisheddocument/121062/638817158705770000
• Sunnyvale: https://www.sunnyvale.ca.gov/home/showpublisheddocument/5921/638826373716870000
• Santa Clara: https://www.santaclaraca.gov/home/showpublisheddocument/86913/638817079281500000
In those documents, you’ll notice the assets each City holds are vastly different, so simply contrasting internal departments to assess the value of services to taxpayers is misleading. A good example is that 92% of Silicon Valley Power’s services are provided for industrial customers, just 6% to residential customers. Just the opposite: the majority of emergency services, of which more than 70% are medical, are provided to residents, not companies.
Unlike neighboring Sunnyvale and Campbell, Santa Clara has a large convention center and a professional sports stadium. It also owns its power stations, requiring 223 full-time employees (FTE) to staff and manage those electric utility assets and services.
For a real apples-to-apples comparison of services provided to residents, look no further than the combined police and fire services in Sunnyvale and Santa Clara. In Sunnyvale, the emergency services’ FY25/26 budget is $114.3 million to support a population of 155,805. Santa Clara has a population of 127,647, but spends significantly more at $179.5 million. (S’vale 1:$734 / S’Clara 1:$1,406)
What’s additionally eye-popping in Santa Clara’s budget forecast is that salaries are currently projected to rise 10.4% in FY25-FY26 and another 4.4% in FY27. Remember, employee unions, including police and fire, are currently negotiating contracts, so the 4.4% may skyrocket based on how the City Council and City Manager’s office negotiate, or if it buckles under endorsement money pressure. Overtime is another big issue, which is projected to grow from $15.8M to $23.2M (46.3%) between the same period.
And look at the Summary of Budgeted Position, which is page 98 in the City of Santa Clara’s FY2026/27 Proposed Operating Budget. Thirty positions throughout the City are frozen due to rising costs and budget shortfalls; 2/3rds of those unfilled roles slow the maintenance of streets and parks.
If residents and readers here were genuinely concerned about the quality of life and services provided to residents, they’d implore city elected and appointed leadership to freeze overgenerous salaries, overtime, and bonuses, redirecting those savings to fill the vacant Public Works and Community Development roles.
Where’s the tie in to Mayor Gilmore bankrupting Santa Clara?? Posting random budget facts without your paid smear campaign is unlike you.
BTW – the quality of life in SC is pretty good. But of course, you wouldn’t know that since you live in San Francisco.
Hey Josh Stephens! If you and your pal Elijah took a break from spending 49ers money on hit jobs against anyone who dares disagree with you and Jed, and instead just paid the City what you actually owe—without all the penny-pinching—you wouldn’t have to churn out yet another blah-blah-blah statement to attack the City with no facts.