CITY BUDGETS : A SPECIAL REPORT : A Balancing Act Between Less Money, Rising Costs

The Irvine City Council is considering new and increased fees, with concerts at Irvine Meadows and boxing at the Irvine Marriott among the targets for the levies. In Huntington Beach, some parking rates are going up. It’s the same story all over Orange County.

With few exceptions, cities wrestling with 1987-88 budgets that refuse to balance are being forced by reductions in anticipated sales and property tax revenues to hike fees and tap reserves--a sign that the county’s economy is slowing down.

Most of the county’s 26 cities still are expecting to take in more taxes in the 1987-88 fiscal year than in the current year--4% to 8% more, in most cases. But city officials say that that rate of growth is only about half of the previous year’s and is not enough to cover rapidly escalating expenses.

There are a few bright spots. Santa Ana, for example, has managed to find enough money to launch a new program to spruce up neighborhoods.

But, faced with a state law requiring balanced budgets, most city councils are struggling to maintain services at current levels.

Garden Grove Assistant City Manager Mike Fenderson summed up the situation described by many of his counterparts in other cities when he said: “We see the economy weakening . . . I see where serious problems will have to be addressed in the future.”

Here is a city-by-city look, in alphabetical order, at how the budget-balancing is going at city halls across the county.

Stanton Major Cost-Cutting to Avert a Shortfall

The city has wrestled hard with its budget this year.

Faced with a $250,000 shortfall in a proposed $8.6-million budget for fiscal 1987-88, the City Council took a major cost-cutting move recently and voted to shift the operations of the 27-member city Fire Department to the county, thus reducing the deficit to $50,000.

Last year’s budget totaled $8.3 million.

Plagued with a small tax base and growing needs for police and fire protection, the council had seriously considered a proposal for a card club in the city. The club would have raised an extra $2.5 million in revenue for the city, according to the man who wanted to build it. But the proposal was rejected by the council on June 9.

The revenue picture is expected to be brighter in 1987-88 than it was this year, with sales tax revenue projected to increase from $2.1 million to $2.4 million. The reason, said City Finance Director Gregory Beaubien, is that two new major discount stores, Home Club and Pricesavers, have located in the city recently.

Contributing to this story were Times staff writers Marcida Dodson, La Mont Jones Jr., Lanie Jones, Ray Perez, Mark I. Pinsky, David Reyes, Bob Schwartz, Nancy Wride and Jonathan Weisman.