Taxation and Fiscal Policy
CivicCause budget overview
San Mateo County Budget Overview
FY 2026-27 Recommended Budget compared with FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget
This comparison shows the County's all-funds headline totals and sources of funding using the official FY 2025-26 adopted baseline and FY 2026-27 May Recommended Budget. Recommended values are proposed/current planning figures, not final adopted values.
Budget status and timeline
Status
FY 2026-27 recommended budget
This San Mateo County comparison is prepared for the FY 2026-27 Recommended Budget. FY 2026-27 values are recommended/proposed, not adopted. Spending by function remains unavailable until a matching source-grounded table is confirmed.
Important dates
Recommended budget posted/submitted
May 22, 2026
Budget hearing
June 9, 2026
Final adoption deadline
No later than October 2, 2026
Adopted vs recommended headlines
These cards compare the adopted FY 2025-26 baseline with the FY 2026-27 May Recommended Budget. Fund balance is shown because it appears as an official source category, but it is not recurring revenue.
Total sources
$5,222,428,565
FY 2026-27 May Recommended
-$293.2M vs FY 2025-26 adopted
Total requirements
$5,222,428,565
FY 2026-27 May Recommended
-$293.2M vs FY 2025-26 adopted
Ongoing revenue sources
$3,478,214,280
FY 2026-27 May Recommended
-$31.7M vs FY 2025-26 adopted
Use of fund balance
$1,744,214,285
FY 2026-27 May Recommended
-$261.5M vs FY 2025-26 adopted
Related causes
Follow the issues behind this budget
These links come from budget categories and cause labels already shown on this page. They point to San Mateo County cause pages where CivicCause tracks related meetings, issues, and civic activity.
Related civic activity
See where budget topics show up in public records
These links use existing cause relationships in San Mateo County: public meetings, tracked issues, and organizations already connected to the same causes as this budget.
Where the money comes from
This comparison uses the approved all-funds source rows only. It compares adopted FY 2025-26 values against FY 2026-27 May Recommended values without relying on the source document's separate revised/change columns.
Taxes
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$1,161,331,916
Recommended
$1,110,486,175
-$50.8M
-4.4%
Licenses, permits and franchise
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$13,518,217
Recommended
$14,767,951
+$1.2M
+9.2%
Fines, forfeitures and penalties
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$8,236,671
Recommended
$8,575,464
+$338.8K
+4.1%
Use of money and property
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$77,975,943
Recommended
$89,191,930
+$11.2M
+14.4%
Intergovernmental revenues
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$1,025,096,846
Recommended
$1,004,438,286
-$20.7M
-2.0%
Charges for services
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$546,743,836
Recommended
$637,909,792
+$91.2M
+16.7%
Interfund revenue
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$227,739,257
Recommended
$178,650,409
-$49.1M
-21.6%
Miscellaneous revenue
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$78,448,030
Recommended
$100,830,701
+$22.4M
+28.5%
Other financing sources
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$370,830,168
Recommended
$333,363,572
-$37.5M
-10.1%
Use of fund balance
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$2,005,724,907
Recommended
$1,744,214,285
-$261.5M
-13.0%
Total sources
FY 2025-26 adopted vs FY 2026-27 May recommended
Adopted
$5,515,645,791
Recommended
$5,222,428,565
-$293.2M
-5.3%
Spending comparison pending
A spending-by-function comparison is not shown yet because the FY 2026-27 Recommended Budget extraction has not produced a matching all-funds requirements-by-major-function table.
The source does include account-class rows, but CivicCause will not relabel account classes as function priorities. That spending view needs a separate source/read-side decision.
Methodology and caveats
The comparison uses FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget as the baseline and FY 2026-27 May Recommended Budget as the current recommended/proposed layer.
FY 2026-27 Revised and source Change columns are not used as the adopted-vs-recommended comparison. They remain validation context only.
- Limited to source-grounded County Summary / All Funds rows. FY 2026-27 Revised and source Change columns are retained only for validation.
- Limited to source-grounded County Summary / All Funds source categories. No spending/function comparison is included.
Sources
San Mateo County FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget
https://smcgov.org/media/156965/download?inline=Section: Attachment A, A-7: All County Funds FY 2025-26 Adopted Sources · Fiscal year: FY 2025-26 · Column: Adopted FY 2025-26
Compact all-funds source categories with adopted amount and percent of total.
San Mateo County FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget
https://smcgov.org/media/156965/download?inline=Section: Attachment A, A-8: All County Funds FY 2025-26 Adopted Requirements · Fiscal year: FY 2025-26 · Column: Adopted FY 2025-26
Compact all-funds requirements by major function with adopted amount and percent of total.
San Mateo County FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget
https://smcgov.org/media/156965/download?inline=Section: Attachment A, A-9/A-10: Total Sources and Requirements - All Funds · Fiscal year: FY 2025-26 · Column: 2025-26 Adopted Budget
Multi-year all-funds summary rows. Column mapping must remain reviewable in row metadata.
San Mateo County FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget
https://smcgov.org/media/156965/download?inline=Section: FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget · Fiscal year: FY 2025-26 · Column: FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget
artifact=source-san-mateo-county-fy-2025-26-adopted-budget.pdf; parser=pdf-parse PDFParse.getText; pages=429
County of San Mateo FY 2026-27 Recommended Budget
https://www.smcgov.org/media/159563/download?inline=Section: County Summary / All Funds · Fiscal year: FY 2026-27 · Column: FY 2026-27 May Recommended
artifact=source-san-mateo-county-fy-2026-27-recommended-budget.pdf; sha256=42b9c5b7e6c0db00c1e052835a135520e18697d6569ec14ab1f41af9d7001131; pages=373