I was born and raised in Santa Barbara, and I’m raising my kids here now. Like a lot of parents in this town, I worry whether the next generation will be able to build a successful future here. That question is about housing and jobs, but it is also tied to something far less talked about: the budget.
On June 30, City Council adopted a budget that the Santa Barbara Independent described as “precariously balanced.” Behind that phrase is a sobering fact. The city had exhausted its contingency reserves and drawn nearly $6 million from its emergency reserves, leaving it nearly $30 million below reserve targets.
Given our exposure to fire, flood, and debris flow, financial reserves are not a luxury here. The city needs cash on hand to respond immediately. Today, we risk facing an emergency with much of that cushion already spent. In District 4, where neighborhoods sit right against the foothills, this isn’t abstract. Many families evacuated during the Tea and Jesusita fires. We all know how quickly an emergency can turn lives upside down.
City staff and the council deserve credit for shrinking a projected deficit of more than $10 million this year through some 200 budget fixes. But many of those were temporary, not structural, fixes: $1.5 million saved by delayed hiring and $4 million from fleet replacement and street maintenance funds. Money redirected from maintenance means work that still needs to get done. You can buy time this way. You cannot run a city long term this way.
When a city faces significant financial strain, maintenance gets deferred, roads don’t get repaved, and potholes don’t get fixed. Borrowing costs climb. Library hours shrink. Response times stretch. Pension bills keep rising. Eventually, residents get the bill, whether in cut services or higher taxes. We did not arrive here overnight. We got here one hard, deferred decision at a time.
Why is this about our kids? Every dollar we spend covering last year’s shortfall is a dollar we cannot invest in making this city livable for the next generation. That means housing young families can afford, safe streets, a downtown with good jobs, coastal adaptation and serious fire preparedness. Fiscal discipline is a precondition for investing in the future.
I’ve spent more than 20 years in corporate and nonprofit leadership, including at The Coca-Cola Company, and now running my own small business. That experience taught me that you can’t fund ongoing costs with one-time fixes, and a budget that drains your savings isn’t really balanced. On Council, I will push for:
• A public plan to rebuild reserves, with targets, a timeline, and regular progress reports.
• No ordinance adopted without a full cost estimate.
• One-time money for one-time costs. Settlements and windfalls should rebuild reserves or fund one-time needs, never recurring expenses.
• Major projects ranked by what we can afford, with outside funding pursued.
• Growing revenue, not just cutting costs. Streamline permits for housing and local businesses to strengthen our downtown tax base.
I want the next generation to also experience a thriving Santa Barbara. That means handing them a city that can maintain its streets, protect its neighborhoods, support local businesses, provide social services, and respond when disaster strikes.
None of this is flashy. It’s the unglamorous work of making sure the next generation inherits opportunities, not unpaid bills.
Genevieve Taft-Vazquez is a City Council Candidate for District 4. She is a native of Santa Barbara and serves on the Neighborhood Advisory Council. Her career has focused on corporate accountability and ethical and sustainable sourcing.
