Camarillo Budget Maintains Current Services : Finances: Unaffected by state funding cuts, the city is avoiding layoffs and is investing in a new police station.

The Camarillo City Council has passed a $29.3-million budget for the upcoming fiscal year that preserves all city services at current levels and boosts reserves by an estimated $600,000.

“It’s basically a hold-the-line budget,” City Manager J. William Little said.

While some neighboring cities are laying off employees and cutting police services, Camarillo is retaining all its workers and investing in a new police station.

Perhaps the main reason for Camarillo’s relatively bright financial picture is that the city is not expected to suffer any state funding cuts in the budget approved by the Legislature this week, Little said.

In contrast, Oxnard will lose $1.2 million in state funding. To cope with the revenue loss, the city has already eliminated five departments and cut 23 1/2 positions.

Likewise, the city of Ventura, which will suffer an anticipated $700,000 cut in revenues, has eliminated 70 positions and cut back on crime prevention programs.

But Camarillo, Thousand Oaks, Simi Valley and Moorpark will escape the funding cuts because they did not get any money from the post-Proposition 13 bailout that the new state budget seeks to eliminate.

But Camarillo officials said there may be another reason why their city is faring better than some of its neighbors.

Five years ago, Camarillo fell into a financial morass when it lost $23 million that its treasurer had sunk into high-risk investments without council approval.

In addition to firing the treasurer and replacing the city manager, the council responded to the crisis by cutting staff and trimming costs to the minimum necessary for survival.

“We did what a lot of cities today are doing and maybe even more so,” Little said. “We wiped out our capital improvement projects,” postponing any major improvements to roads and city-owned buildings. “We didn’t fill positions. We halted all unnecessary travel.”

Councilman Michael Morgan described the city’s spending habits as “very frugal.”

The austerity program is paying off, with the city posting a $4.6-million budget surplus, compared to a $3.5-million deficit immediately after the investment loss in 1988.

With more cash in the bank, the city is loosening the reins on spending for some major projects, including the planned $4.1-million conversion of a local community center into a new station for the sheriff’s deputies who patrol Camarillo.

The city spent $2.1 million for the police station this year and has budgeted another $1.6 million for the fiscal year beginning July 1, with the balance being paid through loans.

The police station construction costs account for more than half of the total $2.6-million increase in expenditures, from $26.7 million to $29.3 million, for the next fiscal year.

In addition to the cost of building the new station, Camarillo will pay the Sheriff’s Department $4.4 million for patrolling the city.

The costs for the sheriff’s patrol are about the same amount the city spent on police services in the previous fiscal year.