Where the money goes
The other side of the budget: what the City plans to spend its main operating fund on.
Menlo Park plans to spend about $89,837,780 from its General Fundin FY 2026-27. About 63 cents of every dollar pays people — salaries for City staff plus benefits like health insurance and retirement.
- Police$29,159,351≈ 32%
- Patrol, investigations, dispatch, and the school resource officer.
- Public Works$18,891,487≈ 21%
- Street and parks maintenance and City facilities. (Public Works also runs the water utility, but that's paid by water rates, not this fund.)
- Library and Community Services$17,488,336≈ 19%
- Libraries, recreation programs, the senior center, preschools, pools, and parks programs.
- Community Development$11,016,920≈ 12%
- Planning, building permits, affordable housing, and code enforcement.
- General Administration$7,120,226≈ 8%
- City Council, City Manager's Office, City Attorney, and communications.
- Administrative Services$5,667,407≈ 6%
- Finance, Human Resources, and Information Technology.
- Non-Departmental$494,053≈ 1%
- Citywide items not attributed to a single department.
The General Fund isn't the whole picture
The City spends roughly another $200 million from other funds. Water rates pay for the water utility, capital project funds pay for big infrastructure, and special grants pay for specific programs. To see those, visit Departments and Capital projects.
›Show source
Department spending is summed from the General Fund budget records for fiscal year 2027 (view v_general_fund, expense lines only), grouped by department; the total is $89,837,780. The “63cents” figure is salaries and benefits ($56,860,060) divided by total General Fund expense ($89,837,780).