News

By Sam Richards

Staff writer

Monday, September 23 (4:30 p.m.): Though some additional tweaks are almost certain, and with several questions remaining to be answered, the combined RWC Board and Finance Committee on Sept. 9 and 10 unofficially endorsed the basics of a draft $23.18 million RWC operating budget for 2026, and an $11.7 million Rossmoor Property Management (RPM) draft budget for 2026.

Perhaps the most notable aspect of the draft RWC budget is an expected drop in the RWC portion of the monthly coupon, the first such price drop in 15 years. Including the Comcast cable TV component, the proposed 2026 RWC coupon is $351.22 per month, a $5.66 reduction from the current 2025 coupon cost. Minus the cable TV cost, which in 2026 will be $61.83 per household, the proposed 2026 RWC operating costs in the coupon are $295.07 per month.

Rossmoor General Manager Jeff Matheson said the reduction of the RWC portion of the coupon was made possible by two actions the Board took at its August meeting. One was to shift the annual RWC Facility and Property Maintenance budget ‒ along with that budget’s balance of about $486,000 in the Facility Maintenance Expense Operating Fund ‒ from the RWC operating fund to its capital fund. That shifts more maintenance funding responsibility away from the RWC portion of residential coupon.

Yet to be accomplished, but to accompany the funding shift, is an increase of the Membership Transfer Fee, paid by first-time homebuyers into Rossmoor. The MTF replenishes the RWC capital fund, from which the RWC Facility and Property Maintenance budget is now paid. The MTF is already scheduled to rise in January to $14,000 per qualifying home sale, up from $13,500 currently.

On Sept. 23, the Finance Committee will discuss whether to support increasing that fee, possibly up to $18,000, which would help fund the new RWC Facility and Property Maintenance budget obligation ‒ and likely result in cutting the coupon even more.

The second Board action that makes a lowered RWC coupon possible, Matheson said, was opting to drop earthquake insurance ‒ $5 million worth, at a savings of  $342,731. That amount would have paid for coverage from January 2026 through May 2027; Rossmoor is moving next year from a January-to-January premium payment cycle to a June-to-June cycle.

The 2026 draft $23.18 million operations budget is up approximately 1.3% from the $22.89 million 2025 operations budget approved in October 2024.

These budget and coupon numbers are not the final ones. Discussion of the operating budget will continue Sept. 23 at the Finance Committee meeting and Sept. 25 at the Board’s regular monthly meeting.

By an informal “straw vote,” the combined Board/Finance Committee also supported adding a full-time digital marketing content creator position in the RWC Communications Department ($101,000 salary and benefits), which was recommended earlier this year by the Marketing Task Force. This position would help Rossmoor market on social media frequented by the adult children who assist their parents in buying here.

The Board and Committee members also signaled support through a straw vote to increase hours for a Golf Shop employee from three days to five days per week ($21,777). Also using a straw vote, the panel decided to postpone paying for an internal control audit, at about $100,000, until RWC’s transition to the NetSuite operating system is complete, likely for 2027.

By contrast, the draft 2026 operating budget does factor in a series of fee increases approved by the Board on Aug. 28, basing budget estimates using fee revenue.

Most of the discussion on the first day of the Sept. 9 and 10 meeting revolved around 2026 budget presentations by the overseers of 21 separate departmental budgets. All departmental budgets, Matheson stressed, are based on maintaining the same RWC service levels as offered this year.

Perhaps because the coupon is set to go down next year instead of up, there was relatively little call by Board or committee members to find more places to cut departmental budgets. There were, however, questions about those draft budgets, including money-column inconsistencies and other matters of detail. Matheson said all such questions will be researched and answered in the next few weeks.

There were also some broader budget discussions, the most in-depth one revolving around Rossmoor’s bus service, with a proposed 2026 budget of $1.144 million. Board member Dwight Walker called it “an extremely expensive program” that, in 2024, cost $29 per trip to operate. And with no weekend service since the COVID shutdowns, the service has also gotten less convenient to use. Ridership, which peaked at 100,000 several years ago, was at 39,000 trips in 2024.

Board member Adrian Byram said the bus service costs residents about $170 per manor per year, and that many residents are unhappy with the service. “For the money we’re paying, we should be doing better,” Byram said.

Matheson said the challenge is paying enough for a service that can attract riders, and it’s hard to strike that affordable-vs.-attractive balance. “For people who use that (bus) service, it’s a lifeline,” he said.

The largest individual department budgets for 2026 were:

• Unallocated/General Services, at $4,625,495, down slightly from this year;
• Public Safety/Securitas, $2,514,177, up about 1.4% from this year;
• Custodial Services, $2,138,894, down about 2% from 2025;
• Recreation, $1,762,914, up about 6% from this year;
• Golf courses, at $1,317,265 down about 7.8% from 2025.

All of those numbers are subject to change as they could be adjusted before the budget is set to be formally adopted at the Board’s Sept. 25 meeting.

The GRF operations budget and the RPM budget are both distinct from RWC’s capital projects budget, which will be determined later this year or early next year. That budget includes major construction projects, large pieces of equipment and related expenses, and is replenished primarily by money from the MTF.