MODESTO – Stanislaus County will cut nearly 150 allocated local government positions from its budget after the Board of Supervisors voted to approve the midyear report of the budget that was OK’d last September.

“The world is not ending here, but it has slowed down as far as our county budget,” said District 3 Supervisor Terry Withrow, who was one of four supervisors to vote in favor of the measure. Only District 5 Supervisor Channce Condit opposed it.

Based on the midyear assessment, the county will cut 143 positions, but about 95 percent of those positions are vacant and unfunded. The majority (111) of the jobs are in the Community Services Agency,

“The county … introduced a two-phased approach to reduce vacancies and align the budget with a more realistic and manageable position allocation,” said Human Relations Assistant Director Jennifer Jacquez. “Phase I focuses on unfunded positions. These are positions that are allocated but do not have active funding, which can artificially inflate position counts and misrepresents true staffing capacity and cost structure.”

Departments identified 135 unfunded positions, of which 107 have been vacant for more than 12 months, according to the report.

“Looking ahead, Phase II will focus on longstanding vacant positions and staff will evaluate strategies to balance normal turnover through attrition while addressing positions that remain vacant for extended periods,” Jacquez said.

The purpose of the midyear report is to keep the board, as well as the public, abreast of the county’s financial health, make necessary changes and help ensure a solid kick down the fiscal year’s home stretch.

“In totality, the recommended 2026 budget totals $1.98 billion, and supports 4,763 allocated positions across the organization,” said Ryan Leupp, the county’s Deputy Executive Officer. “This represents a net $43.4 million in adjustments to the legal budget.”

Leupp explained how the budget progressed since a $1.89 billion spending plan was adopted last September. The legal budget – $1.98 billion as of December – refers to the budget at specific point in time and includes the adopted budget and board-approved adjustments, which are identified through the midyear report and go on to become the midyear budget.

The 2026 midyear budget will be funded $1.41 billion in department revenue, $208.6 million in the use of department fund balance and nearly $353 million from the general fund – a $91 million increase (4.8 percent) over the adopted budget.

“Our budget performance is tracking with what our normal expectations would be at this midway point of the fiscal year,” said Stanislaus County CEO Jody Hayes. “Of course, the budget is really driven by our revenue trends, and those continue to demonstrate what we’d expected for this fiscal year, which is characterized as slowing and modest growth.

“Department expenditures are on track with their expected performance, including some recent labor cost increases that were approved by this board during the first half of the fiscal year. Overall, we continue to operate in a preservation budget mode for our general fund departments. This mode generally supports our existing service levels, but it also recognizes that revenue trends would not support increased service levels at this time.”

The county’s Health Services Agency could trim eight vacant positions, Child Support Services could cut seven, and the Sheriff’s Department could delete four due to a decrease in cannabis revenue.