San Antonio has asked its police and fire departments along with Animal Care Services to cut their spending by 1% over the next two years to help cover the city’s pending $172.62 million budget deficit, City Manager Erik Walsh told City Council Thursday.
Even so, the budget cuts being asked of various city departments aren’t nearly as severe as they could have been, thanks to city-owned CPS Energy, which will contribute $70 million to city coffers over the next two years by selling excess power to nearby municipalities.
San Antonio residents also shouldn’t expect see property tax increases over the next two years in response to the deficit.
The city’s total budget for fiscal 2026 and 2027 totals $4 billion, the largest budget in San Antonio’s history and a 2.2% increase from the previous two-year cycle.
Other cuts Walsh and his team suggested at Thursday’s council meeting include eliminating 68 non-critical city positions, slowing an ambitious police hiring plan and postponing a 3% pay bump for city employees. A majority of council members at Thursday’s meeting opposed doing away with the pay increase.
“You guys work so hard, our council staff work hard and it hurts me that we wouldn’t be able to do that 3%, so I certainly echo my colleagues and hope we can see what we can do there,” District 10 Councilman Marc Whyte said.
Of the 68 positions that Walsh proposes to eliminate, only 35 are currently filled. What’s more, those 35 city employees, who were informed Wednesday of their layoff, will be moved to fill vacant city jobs not affected by budget cuts.
Meanwhile, SAPD was expected to hire 65 patrol officers this upcoming fiscal year as part of a bold promise to add 360 officers over a five-year period. The proposed hiring numbers have dwindled to only 25 new officers in fiscal year 2026, which appeared to upset Chief Bill McManus, who briskly walked out of City Hall following Walsh’s presentation.
Interim District 2 Councilman Leo Castillo-Anguiano, who’s filling in for Jalen McKee-Rodriguez while he’s out on paternity leave, agreed that the city should further examine whether it wants to scale back SAPD hiring.
However, Castillo-Anguiano’s suggestion received swift rebuke from District 7 Councilwoman Marina Alderete Gavito and first-term District 9 Councilwoman Misty Spears, one of just two self-described conservatives on the dais.
“I do want us to continue to explore how adding 65 police officers instead of 25 will look like and seeing where we can make that happen in our budget,” Alderete Gavito said, requesting that Walsh provide an alternative hiring plan to council by next week.
The hiring of additional police officers shaped up to be a point of contention in the upcoming budget, and will be the first topic of several work sessions planned over the next few months, starting on Tuesday.
Council will have to work quickly to finalize the terms of the budget since the next fiscal year begins in October.
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This article appears in Aug 7-20, 2025.