County budget finds windfall, looking for infrastructure projects

By Kevin Jeffries
1st District County Supervisor

The county’s budget is better than expected, for now. This past year was brutal for many families, businesses, and non-profits. When we passed our last budget in June 2020, we were prepared for the worst.

Kevin Jeffries

Fortunately, a combination of higher-than-expected property and sales tax revenues (particularly in the online shopping category) and millions of dollars in CARES Act funding from the federal government has left us with a much-better-than-expected outlook for the end of the year. We also are now receiving additional one-time state and federal dollars for a variety of other programs, from housing to public health to infrastructure.

Our job as stewards of tax dollars will be to make sure this money is used as effectively as possible and that we do not create costly ongoing programs that we will not be able to sustain. While this sudden influx of money has lots of people dreaming big dreams, it would be irresponsible to pretend this money will keep coming.

I’ve submitted lists of specific one-time infrastructure projects to utilize this funding, and I hope we can improve people’s lives with it. This will be discussed further at the budget workshop on June 14.

Help for the I-15?

“We’re from the government and we are here to help you” is said to be one of the scariest phrases in America, and lately it seems that every time the government tries to help on the 91 or the 15, that things just get worse—or at least the worst parts simply get moved somewhere else.

This pattern has repeated itself again with the expansion of the I-15 toll lanes in the Corona area, which promptly created a new choke point, where multiple lanes are dropped and taken away right where the new Express Lanes end, creating a new, day-long traffic nightmare in Temescal Valley.

While this will continue until the Riverside County Transportation Commission can afford to make improvements all the way to Lake Elsinore, myself and a few colleagues on the commission have expressed the frustration of our constituents that yet another expensive project has failed exactly where we (and groups like the Greater Corona Traffic Alliance) had predicted it would.

RCTC has requested millions in federal financial aid to add a free (for once) lane between Cajalco Road and Weirick Road to help mitigate the impacts of those dropped lanes. If approved, help could come fairly quickly, but in the end, it will just be another Band-Aid on a severed artery.

New fireworks ordinance

I have written in the past about a new fireworks ordinance and increased enforcement that I had brought forward to the Board of Supervisors. Dramatically-increased fines and funding for extra Sheriff deputies and Code Enforcement officers in the unincorporated communities that were a part of the ordinance did go forward. A public information campaign will be launched shortly to warn of the dangers of illegal fireworks.

If someone in Riverside County is recklessly endangering your neighborhood with illegal fireworks, call 800-950-2444 to report it.