ON THE AGENDA: Twentynine Palms City Council, May 13, 2025
City budget braces for economic squeeze, City Manager contract negotiations, Youth Council gets State Senator's recognition
City of Twentynine Palms Survey: Let your voice be heard ! Have you taken the City’s strategic planning survey yet? Here’s a link. Share your vision about makes Twentynine Palms special, and what you think the city should focus on in the coming years. The City has not provided a deadline, so do it now!
This upcoming Tuesday, May 13, 2025, the Twentynine Palms City Council will hold their regularly scheduled meeting at 6 pm, where they tackle a 168-page agenda, available here, following a closed session. This marks the fourth of a series of closed sessions on the City Manager’s public employee performance evaluation. Coverage of the last City Council meeting is available here.
PUBLIC COMMENT
You can comment on agenda items and issues important to you at every City Council meeting. Comments on agenda items take place during discussion of that item, while comments on non-agenda items take place near the end of the meeting. The Brown Act prevents Council from commenting on non-agenda items. To comment, just pick up a green or gold form at the entry desk, fill it out, and hand it to the Clerk, who usually sits just in front of the Council bench toward the right.
Here's the list of Council email addresses to write if you can't get to the meeting — be sure to email by 2 pm on the date of the meeting so they have time to read your email prior to discussion. You can also copy the clerk at cvillescas@29palms.org and ask that your letter be made part of the public record, although lately the Mayor has opted to summarize or skip reading emailed comments.
AWARDS, PRESENTATIONS, APPOINTMENTS AND PROCLAMATIONS
Presentation to the Youth Council by Senator Rosilicie Ochoa-Bogh
With projects ranging from senior center volunteer work, community food drives, and outdoor sports events, the Twentynine Palms Youth Council has created quite a reputation for itself since being established one year ago in May 2024. They have now won the recognition of California State Senator Rosilicie Ochoa-Bogh.
Ochoa-Bogh, who was reelected to the California State Senate in November 2024, represents District 19, encompassing the communities of Apple Valley, Banning, Barstow, Big Bear, Cathedral City, Desert Hot Springs, Joshua Tree, Lake Arrowhead, Palm Desert, Palm Springs, Twentynine Palms, Yucaipa, Yucca Valley, and portions of Highland and Redlands.
Ochoa-Bogh’s affinity for Twentynine Palms is apparent compared to the region’s other state and national representatives—the senator was in town back in February where she toured the Twentynine Palms Senior Center.
Applications for the 2025-2026 Youth Council are due this Monday, May 13, 2025, at 6 pm and are open to students in 6th through 12th grade. There is no residency requirement.
CONSENT CALENDAR
The Consent Calendar consists of routine items usually approved with a single vote. The public is given a chance to make public comment on these items prior to the Council motion. Again, fill out a comment form if you wish to address any of the items on this meeting’s Consent Calendar
Items on the Consent Calendar include approval of last meeting’s minutes, a development code update that aligns Planning Commission term expiration with Commission officer elections so both occur in March, approval of a $5,428,099 annual Sheriff’s department contract,1 approval of a $1,055,432.70 warrant register, and an updated Retirement Plan Investment Advisory Services Agreement for City employees.
DISCUSSION AND POTENTIAL ACTION ITEMS
9. Presentation of the Preliminary Two-Year General Fund Budget for Fiscal Year 2025-26 & 2026-27
A new fiscal year begins July 1, 2025, and Council must approve a two-year general fund budget before then. This is a preliminary budget presentation, with a 51-page City Staff report available here, conducted by City Manager H. Stone James and City Finance Director Abigail Hernandez-Conde. Final approval is set to take place at the following Council meeting, May 27.
The City is currently operating with a balanced budget and a small budget surplus.
Despite the opening paragraph of the staff report indicating that budget development included “direction from the City Council during Strategic Planning,” no votes were taken that would have provided that direction. Strategic planning objectives, which are typically finalized prior to the draft budget, have yet to be decided. And in fact, buried under “Transfers In/Out” in the staff report is the statement, “As of the date of this report, the City Council's strategic priorities have not been clearly defined.” Additionally the much-touted community input via the 29 Palms Strategic Plan Community Survey has not been completed. It’s unclear what the timeline is for completing strategic planning as that vote isn’t listed on the timeline provided in the staff report.
Still, this draft strategic planning list is included in the slides to be presented on Tuesday:
Financial Sustainability
Preserving Local Character
Improved Infrastructure
Access to Resources
Local Tourism
Community Outreach and Engagement
The proposed budget acknowledges that some revenue trends are difficult to predict, such as Transient Occupancy Tax (TOT) totals, “primarily due to the current economic uncertainty.”
Funding Law Enforcement
Law enforcement is the City’s largest expense, comprising over 40% of the annual budget with costs increasing annually and even semi-annually due to ongoing labor negotiations between the Sheriff’s Employee’s Benefits Union and County of San Bernardino. The Finance Department has budgeted accordingly in anticipation of rising costs to law enforcement services, but the City could need to reallocate money to keep essential services funded years down the line.
According to the report:
The City's top operating expenditures include the Sheriff's contract and salaries and benefits. For FY 25-26, law enforcement costs represent approximately 41.9% of the City's total operating expenditures, and Salaries & Benefits represent 29.4% of total operating expenditures.
According to the preliminary budget proposal, the addition of just one Sheriff Service Specialist at an annual salary of $108,000 would teeter the general fund budget over the edge, sending the City into a budget deficit of $36,513. The current sheriff’s contract is also projected to increase $100,000 due to unresolved union discussions.
Labor negotiations and increasing personnel costs could pose a future problem for smaller municipalities that contract law enforcement services through the County.
The neighboring town of Yucca Valley, operating with a $12.19 million budget for the upcoming fiscal year, devotes approximately 50.3% of their general fund to its San Bernardino County Sheriff contract to the tune of $6,140,000. This includes funding for a Sheriff Service Specialist2 To mitigate costs, Yucca Valley voters overwhelmingly approved Measure Y, a half-cent sales tax. Will Twentynine Palms need to do the same?
Staffing and Other Expenses
Also looming for the City’s budget are staffing and benefit expenses, which are expected to increase by $219K and $249K for FY 25-26 and FY 26-27 respectively, primarily due to cost of living adjustments. Finance Director Hernandez-Conde is opting to devote an additional $50,000 annual investment into the City’s unfunded pension liability fund to offset the City’s future pension obligations as a result.
$50,000 is also proposed toward community events with an additional $50,000 reserved for the City’s non-profit partners. Also included in the preliminary budget proposal is $13,000 toward an audit of the City’s TOT, based on a random sample of hotels and short term rentals; $16,000 proposed for “Crisis Communication Services” with the intention of improving Citywide communications during emergencies; and $87,000 for trainings and meetings, with an additional $12,500 toward City staff education reimbursement programs.
As for the City’s legal expenses, which remain consistent annually, the report notes:
Maintained the historical legal costs of $118K annually; however, if legal issues arise, legal costs could increase, as was the case in FY 20-21 with the FP5 challenge and the Wastewater issues in FY 22-23.
Use of City legal sources came to question in February 2025 when Councilmember April Ramirez, who serves on the City Council Budget Committee, requested the City look into how the City’s legal resources are used as a future Council-initiated agenda item.
The City’s Building, Safety, and Engineering budget is increasing $106,000 from FY24-25 to FY25-26. The City contracts out building, safety, and engineering services to Charles Abbott Associates, who just renegotiated their contract with the City at the last meeting, where Council approved price increases of 15 to 20% for various safety and engineering services in the City, seen below:
The City currently has a reserve of $11.1 million, or 79% of operating expenditures, which is well in line with the City’s reserve policy of 50-55%. Under current conditions, a surplus of $91.6K is expected for FY 2024-2025, but the addition of increased sheriff costs, such as a Sheriff Services Specialist, and rising City employee costs could change that.
10. Reallocation of Funds to Clean Up Blight
The City Council previously designated $47,010 toward showers and a navigation center for the unhoused, for which negotiations for later fell through. Council has not allowed that money to sit unused, however, instead opting to distribute the funds across various non-profit organizations over the past few months.
At the last City Council meeting, $5,000 of these unused navigation center and shower funds were donated to the Ready 4 Reading Book Club and $1,500 was donated to the Joshua Tree No-Kill Animal Shelter Woof Walk event. $10,000 was donated to CLEP’s Feed the Need food distribution program in February.
City staff is suggesting the remaining shower and navigation center funds go to property abatement and homeless encampment cleanup, with the City staff report citing more than 20 “abandoned or neglected properties” and “a handful of abandoned homeless encampments.”
Given the importance of reducing blight and the cost of removing the debris associated with abandoned homeless encampments, abandoned properties, and neglected properties, City Staff recommends reallocating the remaining $30,510 of the Navigation and Resource Center and shower funds to residential, commercial, vacant land, and homeless camp cleanup.
City staff estimate the cost of cleaning the properties at $30,000 each, while the current Code Enforcement budget only accommodates for $5,000 in property cleanup annually, leaving the City with a potential $600,000 unfunded property abatement bill.
If added to the $5,000 code enforcement fund, it is unclear if the addition of $30,510 would go to clean up of one single property or be distributed among piece-meal work between various properties.
11. City Manager Contract Amendment
Likely due to an ongoing City Manager employee evaluation taking place in closed session prior to the Council meeting, this agenda item simply states, “Link to this Staff Report to be provided prior to consideration of item.”
City Manager H. Stone James was hired by the City of Twentynine Palms in April of 2024 with a negotiated salary of $176,425.60 a year. On top of retirement benefits and medical insurance, including vision and dental, James also receives eight paid vacation days, four paid sick days, 80 hours of personal leave, a $700 per month vehicle expense, and a City-issued cell phone. James previously served as Economic Development Director for Cathedral City.
James replaced interim City Manager Larry Bowden, who filled in for previous City Manager Frank Luckino after Luckino accepted a position as City Manager of Desert Hot Springs. Toward the end of his nine-year employment with the City of Twentynine Palms, Luckino’s base salary exceeded $200,000 annually, with an additional $24,000 benefits package, totaling $231,260.06 in 2022.
FUTURE COUNCIL INITIATED ITEMS
Discussion on the General Plan Update.
Discussion surrounding (i) costs to maintain dirt roads verses paved roads; (ii) what is a City maintained dirt road, a non-maintained dirt road, a road that has been accepted by the City, a road that is private and not accepted by the City; (iii) the City's ability and liability associated with the City periodically maintaining non-maintained roads, and (iv) ways residents can bring non-maintained and non-accepted dirt roads to paved-rural-road standards ready for acceptance into the City's accepted-and-maintained road list.
Shade structures around Freedom Plaza and a possible art fixture with "Freedom Plaza" announcing the location.
A review and discussion of fees as it relates to Site Plan Reviews for ancillary uses.
Discussion on abandoned homes in the community.
Discussion on reorganizing the Homeless and Housing Committee.
Discussion on partnering with the Boys and Girls Club.
Discussion on reviewing policies for non-profits that receive funding from the City.
Discussion of a policy regulating the use of City Attorney resources.
Revisit allocated funds for the portable showers and Navigation Center.
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According to the staff report, “The contract provides for two patrol deputies at all times in addition to one traffic officer (40 hours per week), a school resource officer, two volunteer citizen patrol units, two detectives and related support services”
Smaller cities such as Grand Terrace, Needles, Twentynine Palms, and Yucca Valley rely heavily on contracted first responder services through the County of San Bernardino to retain their incorporated status because these cities do not generate enough property tax revenue to fund these essential services locally/internally.