Santa Clara County cuts 365 jobs amid Trump-induced budget challenges – The Mercury News
Major cuts to critical federal funding continue to wreak havoc on Santa Clara County’s finances, forcing county officials to cut 365 positions in the budget during the fiscal year.
Although the district opens its budget in the middle of the year for revisions, the district has been making changes of this nature for years, with many of the positions eliminated coming from health care.
About $200 million in budget cuts, approved unanimously by the Board of Supervisors at its Feb. 10, comes just months after county voters approved a proposed sales tax measure to help offset some expected losses. The state estimates about $1 billion in lost federal revenue annually because of President Donald Trump’s tax and spending bill that was signed into law last year.
The 365 positions — all but 60 vacant — include 231 positions from the Santa Clara Valley Healthcare System, 45 positions for the Department of Health Behavior, 26 positions for Prison Health, 10 positions for the Public Defender’s Office and 35 positions for the Department of Taxation and Collections. Employees in the 60 filled positions that are being made redundant will be transferred to another job that is no longer available.
The district had already faced several difficult budget cycles in recent years due to slow growth in property taxes and employee costs before recent cuts to the federal Medicaid program strained the district’s coffers.
County Administrator James Williams said that given the elimination of positions over the years, as well as other fundraising strategies he has pursued, “the county’s organization-wide flexibility (for him) has become less and less.”
“It will be a challenge going forward,” he said. “Maintaining the necessary balanced budget is getting harder with each successive round of cuts and the greater uncertainty we have.”
Even with the sales tax measure, which would generate $330 million annually, the district projects a $470 million shortfall for the upcoming fiscal year that begins July 1. The cuts made last week will help fill about $200 million of that gap. The district expects the deficit to continue to grow due to reduced federal revenue, with the loss causing impacts of $500 million during the 2027-28 fiscal year.
“These are no ordinary budget changes,” Board President Otto Lee said in a statement. “They are the direct response to devastating federal cuts that have gutted the public health care and basic needs programs our citizens rely on every day. The board is working now to protect life-saving services and ensure we can continue to serve as a safety net for our most vulnerable neighbors.”
Supervisor Susan Ellenberg said at the meeting that although the district’s decisions in previous years have eased the financial situation, she doesn’t think the Board has all the detailed information needed to make the cuts that will happen.
“We all talk about making difficult decisions. In fact, we haven’t been put to the test yet, but in a way that we can say that we will live by cutting or reducing something of great value because we need to do other things,” he said. “I think in order to do that we have to be very clear about what the implications are.”
