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Dan O'Brien Newsletter — May 17, 2026
📬 Councilmember Dan O'Brien | Culver City | May 18, 2026
Hello Culver City neighbors,
For the first time in three years, Culver City's books balance. The Proposed FY 2026-27 Budget that City Manager Odis Jones delivered to Council last Monday night puts $208 million in projected revenue against $203.9 million in spending, with $4.1 million held in reserve. That is the headline of the week.
Around it: two community conversations on the budget, an expanded film production incentive package, a unanimous environmental resolution, and a brand new public art program that took its first walk through our parks. Here is how it all fits together, and what comes next.
💰 Budget & Finance: The First Balanced Budget in Three Years
🔹 The Proposed FY 2026-27 Budget is on the page. CFO Steven Agostini and City Manager Odis Jones presented Culver City's proposed $393.8 million city budget last Monday, with a General Fund of roughly $203.6 million, $208 million in projected revenue, $203.9 million in expenditures, and $4.1 million held in reserve. The previous budget carried a $16 million imbalance. This one closes it.
→ 💡 What this actually means: Sales tax remains the largest single revenue source at about 24 percent, with Business Tax bringing in just over 15 percent. The diversified base is what makes the structural fix possible, and the Joint Powers Authority the Council approved at the previous meeting is the financing tool now positioned to strengthen our credit ratings for the long haul.
→ 🎯 My take: Mayor Freddy Puza said it best when he closed the agenda item: this is our first balanced budget in three years. I want to recognize Odis Jones, Steven Agostini, and the entire team who put a year of priority-based budgeting work on a single page residents can finally read. The new process invited the community in earlier and earlier, and Councilmember Bubba Fish was right when he called it a total one-eighty from how this used to get done.
👉 Read the city's announcement on the Proposed Budget
👉 Submit feedback to the Budget Input Box
🔹 Two community conversations are now in the books. Wednesday evening at Culver West Alexander Recreation Center and Saturday afternoon at the Senior Center, residents took the budget apart out loud. City staff are now compiling the feedback this week, and that summary becomes part of how Council adjusts before the next big budget vote.
→ ⚡ Why this stretch matters: With the community input phase wrapping up, the next two budget moments on the calendar are where line items get debated and locked. Tuesday, May 26 at 7 PM, Council returns to discuss the Proposed Budget along with public hearings on User Fee and Refuse Rate updates. Then Monday, June 8 at 7 PM, Council holds the Public Hearing for Budget Adoption.
👉 Read the full Crossroads recap of Monday's presentation
🎬 Economic Development: Culver City Just Sweetened the Deal for Film
🔹 Production incentives expanded at Monday's meeting. Building on last November's recovery package for film and television, Council added a fresh round of incentives that went into effect May 11. The per-application Motion and Still Photography fees are now fully waived, a $660 savings per permit. Minimum insurance requirements got reduced to match neighboring municipalities. And the daily use fees for Motion ($350) and Still Photography ($75) permits now carry waivers of up to 60 percent. Over a typical three-day shoot, the total administration fee to film in Culver City drops by roughly $1,700 from already-incentivized levels.
→ 📊 The numbers since December: 15 permits issued, 17 days of shooting, about $33,846 in fees subsidized from the program's capped $500,000 pot. Director of Economic Development Elaine Warner emphasized that the subsidies are drawn from the existing cap, so no additional fiscal impact lands on the General Fund.
→ 🎯 My take, and yes this one is personal: I have spent more than 25 years editing in this industry, and I have watched what happens to local businesses when production cancels a week of shoots. Restaurants, hotels, equipment vendors, drivers, caterers, hair and makeup, every link in the chain feels it. California expanded its statewide Film and Television Tax Credit Program to $750 million annually through 2030. CBS announced "Tracker" is leaving Canada to come back to LA this summer. Culver City has been the Heart of Screenland for a reason, and Council just made it a little easier for productions of every size to choose us.
👉 Read the full breakdown of the new incentives
🔹 Small Business Month continues all May. The proclamation Council adopted at our April 27 meeting runs through the end of the month, and the timing pairs naturally with the production-friendly news. Every film shoot that books here brings spend to a small business somewhere in Culver City, and every Saturday morning at the Farmers Market is its own version of the same economic ecosystem.
🚲 Transportation: Bike Day Lands Thursday
🔹 Free CityBus rides this Thursday, May 21. On Bike Day in LA, Culver CityBus joins LA Metro, Big Blue Bus, and the other regional transit agencies in waiving fares for any commuter who boards with a bike, folding bike, or helmet. Bike Culver City and CityBus volunteers will be set up at two pit stops with coffee and swag: the Duquesne entrance to the Ballona Creek Bike Path and the Washington Boulevard side of Ivy Station next to the Culver City Bike Lanes.
→ 🎯 Why this connects back to the budget: Council also proclaimed May as National Bike Month at the April 27 meeting, and at that same meeting we authorized an additional $3 million in bond proceeds specifically dedicated to "safe streets" and "complete streets" work in direct response to public comment. Bike Day is a one-day celebration. The bond decision is what funds the year-round infrastructure underneath it.
👉 Bike Culver City and Bike Day details
🎨 Arts & Culture: Colorful Communities Takes Its First Steps
🔹 The Colorful Communities program launched at El Marino Park. Artist Deborah Aschheim opened the first community-based public art residency on May 9 with a "time-slip" drawing project that overlays the original pilots of the former Mines Field airport, the airfield once owned by Margaret Perry and her friend Amelia Earhart, with the faces of current Sunkist Park residents. Aschheim was joined by Daniela Ossemer Guimarães of the Ninety-Nines Los Angeles Chapter for a brief history of the international piloting sorority that has connected female aviators across 44 countries for nearly a century.
→ 💡 What comes next: The program rolls out community by community through this phase, with stops still ahead in Culver West, Lucerne/Higuera, and Fox Hills. Each neighborhood gets its own assigned artist working with the Cultural Affairs Division to build a piece that reflects the place.
→ 🎯 My take: Public art done well does two things. It marks a place. And it asks neighbors to look at where they live with fresh eyes. Both of those are what I love about Culver City. The Wende's growth from a warehouse to a community resource started exactly the same way, with one neighbor and one conversation. I am rooting for every artist in this cohort.
👉 Cultural Affairs Commission and Public Art
🔹 Frameworks 2026 is open at the Wende. A new exhibition opened at the Wende Museum this past weekend, with photography and visual storytelling that fits naturally alongside the Colorful Communities programming.
🌍 Environment: Unanimous Resolution on Industrial Boiler Decarbonization
🔹 Council voted 5-0 on Monday to support South Coast AQMD's Rules 1146 and 1146.1 amendments. The resolution urges the regional air quality district to accelerate the transition of industrial boilers to zero-emission alternatives, with implementation targets that align with the state's broader decarbonization timeline. The item moved off the consent calendar for discussion and came back with a unanimous vote.
→ ⚡ Why this matters here: Culver City sits inside the South Coast AQMD's footprint along with most of the LA basin. When we add our voice as a council to a regional rules amendment, we move the political math by a fraction. Climate progress at the regional scale is exactly how a five-and-a-half-square-mile city contributes to a problem larger than itself.
👉 Read the resolution coverage
📅 Dates and What's Ahead
🔹 Thursday, May 21. Bike Day. Free CityBus rides with a bike, folding bike, or helmet.
🔹 Saturday, May 23. Bead Society Pop-Up Sale, community fundraiser.
🔹 Sunday, May 24. VOX Femina presents "I, Too, Sing America" at Mayme Clayton Library.
🔹 Monday, May 25. City offices closed in observance of Memorial Day.
🔹 Tuesday, May 26 at 7 PM. Regular City Council Meeting (rescheduled from Monday). Proposed Budget discussion and Public Hearings on User Fee and Refuse Rate updates.
🔹 Wednesday, May 27, 10 AM to noon. Compost Hub at Syd Kronenthal Park. Fourth-Wednesday session with LA Compost.
🔹 Tuesday, June 2. California Statewide Direct Primary Election. Vote-by-mail ballots are already in mailboxes.
🔹 Monday, June 8 at 7 PM. Regular City Council Meeting. Public Hearing for Budget Adoption.
🔹 Every Tuesday, 2-7 PM. Downtown Farmers Market. Main Street. Grab produce, support local growers, and say hello to neighbors.
👉 Visit the Farmers Market page
🔹 How to watch and participate in meetings. Agendas post Wednesdays before Monday meetings. You can attend in person or virtually.
🙏 A Closing Thought: Healthy Me, Healthy City
A quick personal aside that has nothing, yet everything to do with civic life. Beverly and I got away for a couple of days at the end of last week to celebrate the wedding of dear friends Angie and Scott's daughter in Bryan, Texas, surrounded by my wife's Kappa sisters from USC and their families. Yesterday morning, I was 12 miles deep into a roundtrip on Cucamonga Peak, the first time I have tackled that hike in years, with my body finally feeling like itself again after a long winter. Fifteen pounds down from where I started in February. Slower than I used to be on the descent. Grateful for every step of it.
I share all that because showing up for this city over the long haul depends on showing up for myself first. A weekend away with Beverly, a hike that pushed me, a body that is finally working with me again instead of against me, those are not detours from the job. They are how I stay ready for it.
The budget that landed Monday is the longest game we play together as a city. Bike Day, the Colorful Communities walks, the boiler resolution, the Farmers Market on Tuesday, those are the short games we play in the meantime. Both depend on neighbors being willing to participate.
I want to spotlight the residents who showed up at Culver West Alexander on Wednesday and at the Senior Center on Saturday to talk through the budget out loud. Your comments are now in the staff summary that shapes what Council debates on May 26. That is not symbolic engagement. That is the work of keeping our city healthy and happy. Thank you.
If something on your mind belongs in front of Council before May 26, send it. I read every note.
