Mayor Jones proposes killing Ready to Work to close budget deficit

Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones wants the City Council to consider redirecting millions of sales tax dollars raised for Ready to Work, the job training program initiated by predecessor Ron Nirenberg, to make up for a dire budget shortfall.

Such a move would end the program, which has struggled to meet its targets since it launched in 2022.

But it would help the City Council avoid having to increase San Antonio's property tax rate to close the nearly $158 million budget deficit the city faces over the next two fiscal years because of rising expenses, shrinking property tax revenue and slowing sales tax collections.

"As I have shared, raising our neighbors' property taxes during this time is my last resort," Jones wrote in a Tuesday memo to the City Council. "Before we pursue such an option - to either close the $158 million budget gap and/or to raise the 2027 bond capacity - we owe it to our neighbors to explain how we have reduced costs and redirected existing funds to higher priority efforts."

Jones told the council that she has asked City Manager Erik Walsh and City Attorney Andy Segovia "to help frame a discussion about potentially redirecting the remaining Ready to Work funds to priority projects that we originally envisioned funding in either the General Fund or in the 2027 bond."

The city collected $235.8 million for the program, according to the program dashboard. Of that, $123.8 million remains to be spent.

Jones said in her memo that if Ready to Work "began winding down at the end of this year," that would leave the city with $100 million.

San Antonians would have to vote to redirect the Ready to Work dollars - an election that Jones said could take place as early as November. A majority of council members would have to vote to call such an election.

San Antonio's job training initiative, which is the largest such effort ever attempted among U.S. cities, is one of Nirenberg's legacy projects. He reached his term limit, leaving office in June 2026 after eight years in office, and he is widely expected to succeed Bexar County Judge Peter Sakai in January.

Nirenberg defeated Sakai in the March Democratic primary, and he'll face social conservative activist Patrick Von Dohlen, the GOP nominee, in November.

With joblessness spiking early in the COVID pandemic, Nirenberg rallied San Antonio voters six years ago to approve devoting 1/8-cent of city sales tax from December 2021 through December 2025 to pay for a job-training program geared toward unemployed and underemployed workers - with the broader goal of making a dent in generational poverty in San Antonio.

The ballot language said the taxes would be used "for the purpose of financing authorized programs related to job training and the awarding of scholarships."

Seventy-seven percent of voters OK'd the November 2020 ballot measure, which also indefinitely allocated the sales tax collection to VIA Metropolitan Transit starting this year. The transit agency is using the funds to expand its public bus system.

Since Ready to Work launched began accepting applicants in 2022, it has yet to achieve its goal of placing 80% of participants into jobs paying at least $15 an hour within six months of finishing their city-funding training, which entails completing a bachelor's degree or an industry-recognized certificate. That rate was 63% as of Tuesday, according to the dashboard.

The city has also scaled back its enrollment targets.

To date, close to 17,000 people have enrolled in the program. Of those, about 5,750 found an approved job and are earning an average annual pay of nearly $45,000, up from the average $11,300 they earned before.

Jones wrote in her memo that Ready to Work dollars could also pay for projects that would otherwise be funded in a city bond program.

Because of falling property tax collections, the city's bonding capacity has been cut in half. In January, city staff estimated that a future bond could pay for $625 million worth of projects - far less than the record $1.2 billion bond program that voters approved in 2022, which paid for about 180 projects.

Jones said in her memo that staff have revised that estimate to less than $600 million.

"As you know, $600 million was already well below what our community was expecting, and certainly well short of our community's infrastructure needs," she wrote to the council.

It's unclear what would happen to program staff if Ready to Work ends. The city hired Mike Ramsey in 2021 as executive director of its new Workforce Development Office, which counts almost two dozen staffers.

Jones criticized Ready to Work's missed goals  while on the campaign trail in 2025 and pledged to, in her first 100 days of office, find a way to get 90% of participants placed in an approved job within 90 days of completing the program - which has not happened. However, she did not call for axing the program.

COPS/Metro Alliance, which is one of Ready to Work's staunchest defenders, says Jones' preferred target is not realistic. The interfaith grassroots advocacy group partnered with Nirenberg to rally voters to approve the program.

Nirenberg defended Ready to Work during his final State of the City event in April 2025.

"Let's stop talking about poverty if we're not willing to do something about it," he said at the event.

Subscribe

Read this story on expressnews.com