California Mayors Fight For Redevelopment Agencies
SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) – San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee is leading a delegation of mayors headed to Sacramento this week to fight California Governor Jerry Brown's proposal to cut local redevelopment agencies.
In an effort to help balance the state's $25 billion budget deficit, Brown has proposed eliminating redevelopment agencies statewide.
Lee said that has left many cities that rely on redevelopment funds scrambling for alternatives.
"By eliminating those tools, that places all these great projects in jeopardy," Lee said. "It places the thousands of jobs that are associated with rebuilding these areas in extreme jeopardy."
KCBS' Barbara Taylor Reports:
Lee said the group is now taking their own proposal to the governor.
"We're actually offering a way to get a lot of things done and at the same time, help our governor with a very serious debt," he said. "We're not deaf to that at all."
Under the plan, redevelopment agencies would be saved, but spending would be cut 40 percent by 2018. Five percent of its property tax revenue would immediately be returned to the state to support a $1.7 billion bond to plug the budget gap.
(© 2011 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
