We pushed hard to deliver this: San Diego County’s new balanced budget plan closes the gap without cutting the core services families rely on.

Despite millions of dollars in federal cuts and cost shifts, this budget keeps local finances in check, and protects libraries, parks, emergency response, behavioral health, homelessness services, veterans services, and food assistance.

Here’s how we did it.

( Note from Team Terra: Read to the end for a very special announcement )

Closing the Budget Gap Without Cutting Services

The standard we set for the Fiscal Year 2026-2027 budget was simple: work as hard as the taxpayers that we represent.

That means doing the hard internal work first — finding savings, modernizing outdated systems, reducing avoidable costs, and making taxpayer dollars work harder — before asking families to absorb service cuts.

We did that through fiscal sustainability actions proposed by our County operations team and the subcommittee I serve on with Vice Chair Monica Montgomery Steppe, including:

• Modernizing outdated phone and communications systems
• Tightening our real estate footprint to reducing unnecessary lease and office costs 
• Right-sizing our vehicle fleet
• Responsibly unlocking excess reserves to put them to work
• Centralizing shared administrative functions.
• Restructuring operations to increase flexibility and reduce costs

Here's what that means for you: 

• No reductions in library hours or park access
• No cuts to emergency response or public safety services
• No unnecessary layoffs that would worsen service delivery
• Continued funding for behavioral health, homelessness response, veterans services, food assistance, and other safety-net programs that thousands of San Diegans depend on

But We’re Not Out of the Woods Yet

We also have to be honest about what’s ahead.

Federal changes through H.R. 1 — the so-called 2025 “Big Beautiful Bill” — are already creating real costs for counties like ours.

In plain English: Washington is cutting and shifting costs, and counties are being forced to pick up more responsibility for services that families still need.

This budget had to carve out local funding to absorb the first wave of known federal impacts, including:

• $7.9 million for 122 new staff to meet new federal CalFresh requirements
• $15.8 million for new CalFresh administrative cost shifts 
• $44.7 million to address mid-year H.R. 1 implementation costs, emerging federal impacts that are not yet fully quantified, and other safety net needs 

Unfortunately, these impacts will not stop this year.

Next year’s local costs are currently estimated to range from $44.7 million to more than $241.1 million, depending on future state and federal decisions.

And that number does not even capture the full downstream impact on hospitals, clinics, emergency rooms, housing, behavioral health services, and families across our region.

But no matter what gets thrown at us, we are going to keep doing the hard work:

• Finding savings
• Protecting services
• Making taxpayer dollars work harder
• Preparing for the federal impacts still ahead

That is how we keep San Diego County strong, stable, and ready for what comes next.

In service,

Terra

P.S. A note from Terra’s team

On Monday, Terra gave birth early to a beautiful baby girl.

The baby came ahead of schedule, but her health is good and so is Terra’s. We anticipate a rapid recovery for both. Please join us in congratulating mamma and baby!