by Mark McDermott
A moment occurred midway through last Thursday’s State of the City event that was indicative of Manhattan Beach’s civic affairs, and in many ways the city itself.
City Manager Bruce Moe had just finished his presentation, touching on the city’s strong finances, rebounding tax revenues, many projects afoot, and even a rousingly positive public survey about City Hall’s performance. Moe then brought to the dais MBPD Chief Derrick Abell, who is about to retire after 31 years on the force, to do his presentation.
“As many of you know, Chief Abell is retiring, and we’re in the process of recruiting his replacement. But Derrick is sticking with us until that process is completed and so I think I should be able to finish in the next three or four years,” Moe quipped, noting that he’s talked to Abell’s wife about prolonging that search.
Then Moe turned slightly more serious.
“I’ve had the pleasure of working with Derrick for 30-plus years here, and there’s no finer police chief in the state or in the country,” Moe said. “I’m proud to call him my friend and to have worked alongside him. And this community has been so fortunate to have Derrick — I don’t think we’ll even know how fortunate we are until he’s not here.”
Then the two men exchanged a big hug. Like Abell, Moe is a homegrown civic service star who rose up through the ranks to become one of the city’s most significant leaders, but one who carries himself with consistent good humor and grace. “I love you, man,” Moe could be heard saying as the two old friends embraced.
Most cities host State of the City events of some sort. Few cities have an actual state of city anything comparable to Manhattan Beach. As Moe’s former finance department colleague, retired city controller and 48-year city veteran Henry Mitzner, liked to say, “When it’s bad out there, it’s good here, and when it’s good out there, it’s great here!”
The fact that a 100 people were able to gather at the Joslyn Community Center, and that Moe, and Abell were able to embrace without masks was itself a positive indicator for the City, which had not held an event like this in two years. Emerging from the pandemic was one of the themes of the event, which was hosted by the Manhattan Beach Chamber of Commerce and included representatives from every City department, as well as the Manhattan Beach Unified School District, and the Beach Cities Health District. At the outset, MB Chamber president and CEO David Archer conducted a question and answer session with Mayor Hildy Stern. He began by asking about post-pandemic Manhattan Beach.
“The last two years have been challenging, to say the least, for businesses, schools and residents, and from a Chamber perspective,” Archer said. “The most significant thing that we achieved is cooperation. That’s probably the only silver lining we have out of this pandemic. The Chamber has been the voice of business; we communicated with businesses and the community about all the COVID regulations and changes almost on a daily basis….Mayor Hildy, what do you see as the biggest challenge for the city coming out of the pandemic?”
Stern has been at the center of a storm, not just with the pandemic but with the cultural wars that have emerged over social justice and Bruce’s Beach. In that context, her answer addressed how maintaining the bonds that create community is the biggest challenge, and something that Stern was hopeful about as things begin to return to something approaching normalcy.
“What we’ve really learned through all of this, and what we’re reminded of so clearly, is how interconnected we are,” Stern said. “So you mentioned working together, and that’s really the most important piece — how we have moved together, we’ve recognized how important our participation in this community is, and how much we really are connected.”
Archer asked about the city’s finances. Stern acknowledged that the City went through an unsettling time, but said that the prudent, fiscally conservative approach taken prior to the pandemic had allowed the City to weather the storm.
“Now, we’re seeing this recovery, that’s typically what we call the V shaped recovery,” she said. “We’re seeing growth in our major revenue sources. And so with the very strong financial market, and the strong real estate market, we’re seeing an increase in many of the areas that have the most impact on our revenue sources.”
Moe’s presentation underscored this. He led with the fact that the City has not only maintained a balanced budget throughout the pandemic, but now has an $8 million surplus, due to an infusion of federal American Relief Plan funds. And, crucially, Manhattan Beach has maintained its rarefied AAA credit rating from Standard & Poor’s.
“Why is that important? It makes our borrowing cost lower than other cities that don’t have as good a credit rating,” Moe said. “It’s just like when you have your FICO score at a high level; it’s no different for a city. But having a AAA credit rating is not something that’s handed out easily. It’s a handful of cities. Last time I checked, there were 25 in the state that had a AAA credit rating from Standard and Poor’s, so it speaks volumes about the city’s financial management, the leadership from the council, but also it’s important for the business community, because I’ve actually had businesses call and say wow, you’re AAA credit rated. We want to be part of that because, hey, we know it’s well run. We maintain our streets, our infrastructure, and we do things the right way.”
Remarkably, the City’s property tax — which comprises 46 percent of its overall revenues — increased steadily throughout the pandemic, from $27.5 million in fiscal year 2020 to $32 million this fiscal year.
“When you hear other communities are having a hard time when the economy suffers, they may be sales tax based,” Moe said. “They go with the economy. Property tax is fairly stable and grows every year.”
After two down years bottoming out at just over $8 million last year, the City’s sales tax rebounded this year to $9.7 million, exceeding the pre-pandemic figure of $9.3 million registered in 2019. Likewise, the City’s transient occupancy tax, or hotel “bed” tax, cratered to about $2.4 million last year but spiked up to $4.6 million this year, exceeding the $4.3 million registered in 2019.
Moe was particularly excited, however, about some numbers that had little to do with revenues. The City this year commissioned a survey of its residents to see what they thought of municipal services, and local quality of life. The positivity of the results surprised even the polling consultants. The survey showed 88 percent of residents were satisfied with the City’s overall performance. The quality of life numbers were likewise through the roof.
“So this is how our residents viewed as the overall quality of life in Manhattan Beach — 95 percent favorably view the quality of life here, 93 percent viewed as a safe place to live, 85 percent think it’s a great place to recreate, 84 percent say It’s a good or excellent place to raise a family, and 81 percent rated it highly for shopping and dining,” Moe said.
As Abell took the microphone from Moe, the normally loquacious chief paused for a moment and took in the room at what will surely be his last State of the City.
“I was going to use slides but I am going to speak from the heart today,” Abell said. “This has been a challenging couple of years for all of us. That said, I can’t even begin to tell you how much it means to the police department the support that we have had from this community, the Chamber of Commerce, our residents, and our visitors, in many cases. We have had so much support from the ground level up that I am so thankful we are blessed.”
Abell had some good news to deliver to the business community. The Rosecrans and Sepulveda corridor had seen a spate of commercial burglaries, with 15 businesses broken into since January, compared to only one in the same time period last year.
“That was a 1300 percent increase,” Abell said. “But just to understand, the person who was responsible we actually captured last week. Our detectives went out, and we were able to capture this subject with the help of our businesses.”
Typical of the chief, he used the opportunity to encourage businesses to do their part in increasing public safety.
“So understand, the video equipment that you have, all the recording equipment, whether it’s Ring or whatever devices you have — it is extremely helpful in helping to curb some of the burglaries out there and to assist our police department.” ER
