A $4.55 million increase meets a revenue decline
Kern’s Schedule 8 lists $9,055,788 in actual 2024–25 Building Inspection financing uses and $13,610,647 in the adopted 2025–26 plan. The $4,554,859 increase equals 50.3%.
Schedule 5 moves the other direction: additional financing sources fall from $9,513,642 to $8,783,884, a $729,758 decline, or 7.7%.
| Measure | FY 2024–25 actual | FY 2025–26 adopted | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Additional financing sources | $9.51M | $8.78M | −7.7% |
| Financing uses | $9.06M | $13.61M | +50.3% |
| Uses above current sources | None | $4.83M | Balance-funded |
The fund plan uses accumulated resources
Schedule 2 closes the $4,826,763 difference with $4,327,120 in available fund balance and a $499,643 decrease to obligated balances. Those two entries plus current financing sources exactly equal the adopted uses.
Fee-supported funds can accumulate money for uneven project or enforcement cycles. The records establish a planned draw, not that officials depleted the fund improperly.
Permit demand and turnaround are missing
The schedules do not disclose permit counts, valuation, inspector vacancies, plan-check backlog or average processing time. Without those measures, the 50% increase cannot be tied to a specific service result.
A public dashboard pairing fee revenue, staffing and completion times would allow residents and builders to judge whether the larger use of reserves reduces delays.
Method and limitation
The newsroom matched the Building Inspection fund across the government-fund summary and detailed financing-source and financing-use schedules, then recomputed the differences.
The 2025–26 figures are adopted amounts. Later amendments and actual collections may change both the revenue decline and the balance draw.