Kevin

Difficult budget choices, increased community involvement, and downtown connectivity top Roseville’s priority list for 2018.

While the overall economy is doing well, Roseville—like cities everywhere—has challenges. Changes in consumer lifestyles and spending habits mean less sales tax revenues to California cities. Online purchases result in a $3-4 million loss in sales tax revenues for Roseville. We face budget shortfalls in our annual operating budget and our need to pay for long-term obligations.

Short-term, operational needs—Cost increases and flattened sale tax growth contribute to a $2 million annual operational budget gap. Because we’re committed to living within our means, services may be reduced or eliminated to ensure that expenses don’t exceed revenues.
Long-term obligations—During the recession, in order to avoid drastic cuts to services as revenues tumbled, we borrowed from accounts that fund long-term obligations in order to pay for operations and community services. We were living beyond our means during a time of crisis. Now we need to replenish those accounts, which fund things like capital-improvement projects, infrastructure rehabilitation, and pension obligations.

EngageRoseville

Our EngageRoseville effort ensures that everyone has the opportunity to tell us what services matter most to them. You can find out more about those services by watching some short videos, listening to our podcast series and attending or viewing a Community Priorities Advisory Committee meeting. All of these are on the city’s newly designed website. Please share this with your friends and neighbors. We want to make sure everyone has a chance to participate.

Downtown’s evolution

Monies used to pay for improvements downtown come from restricted funds and grants that can’t be used for operational needs. That’s why you see so much progress continuing in our downtown.

You will see increased parking and connections to bike trails and Royer Park in Downtown this year. The Oak Street Parking Facility behind the Roseville Theater will open in April and has more than 400 free parking spaces.

Work on two pedestrian bridges across Dry Creek will also begin this year. These will help connect downtown with Royer Park. These projects include finishing bikeways to connect existing trails north and south of downtown.

And the new Fire Station No. 1 is scheduled to open this spring. This will allow the University Development Foundation, which is purchasing the old fire station, to begin renovations to help attract a new university to South Placer County. The facility will house the initial site of a to-be-determined university as it builds a large campus west of city limits.