Chandler’s budget and policy director, Matt Dunbar, speaking during a March 24 work session, explains how many proposed permanent positions would be added to the city’s payroll in fiscal 2026.
Courtesy of City of Chandler
This chart shows which streams of federal grant funding Chandler city staff believe are most and least at risk in fiscal 2026 and 2027.
Putting together a billion-dollar annual city budget is no small task — especially when many streams of federal funds seem to have an uncertain future.
For city of Chandler leaders, at least one aspect of its budget isn’t really at the whim of federal officials. Like many cities its size, Chandler not only is growing but it is adding at least a few new positions to its workforce.
It’s also transitioning some positions from temporary to permanent now that almost all COVID-19 relief funding has been spent.
“The process of determining staffing is undertaken annually by every department director,” Dunbar said. “When they bring forward their net full-time employee requests each spring, they’re trying to make sure they don’t burn out existing staff and that they’re meeting the demands the public has upon them.”
A report states the city plans to add only 18 new positions to its current workforce of about 1,804 full-time employees. That would be considerably fewer than the 48 new positions added for fiscal 2025.
Twelve of those 18 additions will be conversions from one-time funded positions to ongoing, with nine of those conversions for Neighborhood Services staff. Last year, there were 26 such positions converted.
Two positions — a transportation engineer and an assistant city attorney for litigation — will be full-time employees paid with “revenue/re-allocation offsets,” the report states. There were eight such positions in the fiscal 2025 budget.
Three positions — a community risk reduction manager for the Chandler Fire Department and a crime prevention specialist business systems network analyst for Chandler Police — are the only fiscal 2026 proposed positions to be added to general-fund costs. There are six such positions funded for fiscal 2025.
A senior water quality technician position would be the only one added and covered with non-general funds. Three positions were added there a year ago.
The report states there were five full-time positions added for fiscal 2025 “related to CIP projects,” with none slated to be added for fiscal 2026.
Dunbar said the city’s prevailing “structural balance” philosophy is to not use one-time funding for salaries any more than is absolutely necessary, as all such funding eventually disappears and those salaries, if the positions are kept, must be funded by ongoing annual budgets.
Dawn Lang, the city’s chief finance officer, said every time there’s a full-time vacancy in the city, there’s analysis of whether that position needs to be filled.
Council approved a $1.629 billion budget for fiscal 2025, which runs July 1, 2024 to June 30, 2025. The city’s fiscal 2026 budget — for the year that begins July 1 of this year, is likely to be very close to that number, Dunbar said. Tax revenue changes and the true end of COVID-19 state and federal stimulus will pull fiscal 2026 revenue down somewhat, though the city workforce expansion and a long list of capital projects will increase spending.
Dunbar explained overtime and temporary positions are part of departmental annual budget requests, rather than the fixed full-time salaried and hourly-wage costs he and other finance and budget staff manage and account for in annual budgeting.
He said meetings are held every five months with department heads with regard to overtime, knowing some departments involving public safety or essential utilities and will inevitably have some level of overtime spending each year.
Council address its 10-year and fiscal 2026 capital improvement plans in a March 27 work session to be addressed in a separate story.
Next up in the city’s annual budget process will be a daylong budget briefing on Friday, May 2, at which department directors typically read off and explain their 2026 requests.
That will be followed by a tentative budget adoption at a May 22 meeting, a public hearing and final adoption of the budget on June 12 and adoption of the annual primary property tax rate and fee action on June 26.
Jason W. Brooks News Editor | Chandler Independent
Jason W. Brooks joined Independent Newsmedia, Inc., USA, in July 2021 as an associate editor. After a year covering Buckeye, he has covered Chandler since the fall of 2022, in addition to assisting the Daily Independent throughout his time at INI.
Education: University of New Mexico, bachelor of arts in journalism and mass communication, print emphasis, English minor.
Random Fact: He and his siblings witnessed a Space Shuttle launch and landing in the same year in person, on opposite coasts.
Hobbies: Karaoke, bicycling and American Sign Language.
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