City Council directs the City Manager to look into ways to grow revenue by contracting with surrounding cities.
NEWS Tonight City Council voted unanimously to "identify additional opportunities to contract with other nearby cities." In other wides, Long Beach is looking to grow revenue and hire more City staff by getting business from the cities that surround us.
As Vice Mayor Richardson colorfully explained, "Let's be honest we're shinning right now and people are interested." What Richardson means is that because of recent reports that Long Beach's health department rolled out the COVID-19 better than other cities, our city run services are in demand.
"If we are being smarter we could really leverage our resources," said Councilman Al Austin. Rather frankly Austin pointed out that Long Beach has a hole in its center that contracts with LA County instead of Long Beach.
Councilman Austin is right. Years ago, Long Beach lost a bid to have our City's fire department service Signal Hill. Instead Signal Hill contracted with LA County.
This could be an opportunity for Councilman Supernaw. He could use permanent funding for Engine 17 that when out of service puts additional stress on Engine 10. Along with being one of the busiest engines in the City, Engine 10, is housed in Councilwoman Saro's 6th District.
Thus, creative revenue generating moves like this agenda item can literally be life saving.
Councilwoman Mungo was relieved that this agenda item came forward. "This is something Al and I have talked about for years when I was Vice Chair on the budget committee," said Mungo.
In a show of the extent of need, Councilwoman Mungo explained how that her office often plays "triage" on the phone when residents from unincorporated parts of Long Beach call regarding public services such as trash.
"What color are your trash cans?" This is the question the Councilwoman's staff asks residents unwittingly living in unincorporated areas of Long Beach. If the trashcans aren't brown and purple the staff knows its not our City.
Dave Shukla made public comment during this agenda item asking that Council take this opportunity to also consider community choice aggregation. While the term is a mouthful, it basically allows local governments to get power on behalf of their residents and businesses, from alternative and more green power suppliers.
Judging by the swift call for a vote after a single public comment, Council was hardly interested in Dave's call for "structural budget realignment from oil and into clean energy." Council has their eye set on plugging the holes in our budget and taking advantage of the momentum we gained after positive media coverage on our COVID-19 vaccination roll out.
Don't worry Dave. We heard you. The environment matters.
Councilwoman Cindy Allen was rather forward when explaining that she was looking forward to bringing in more revenue and "hiring more City staff."
Of all the Councilpersons is seems that the Vice Mayor is the most primed to pick up service contracts for Long Beach. "There are 5 cities halls closer to my house than my own city hall," Richardson said before correcting himself to add a sixth. Richardson says that he "makes it a point to work with different City Managers because we share borders."
Given his rolodex of city managers, when our City enters the negotiation room Vice Mayor Rex Richardson ought to be at the table.
In any event, the idea of our city bringing in revenue without raising our taxes gives many residents a sigh of relief.
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