Rick on the Issues
Public Safety
Keeping our neighborhoods safe is Rick’s number one priority, and the results prove it. Under Rick’s leadership, crime in our community is down 19% year over year. That happened because Rick invested in our police and fire departments, strengthened community partnerships, and focused on both prevention and response.
Rick has led the City’s efforts in gang prevention and intervention, increasing funding for violence prevention programs and community-oriented policing. He built a partnership with the Tower Property Business Improvement District that has delivered measurable improvements along the Broadway corridor. And he championed Measure L, which provides dedicated funding for Sacramento’s youth, because giving young people positive outlets is one of the smartest investments a city can make in long-term safety.
Public safety also means our kids can walk to school without risk. Rick pushed for the City’s Quick Build Program, which delivers targeted traffic safety improvements faster and at lower cost. That program has already made improvements at Crocker Riverside Elementary School and the intersection of Sutterville and Mead, which were identified as priorities by the community.
Rick’s office also partnered with the Land Park Community Association’s Traffic Safety Committee to identify and address four priority areas for pedestrian and bicycle safety. All four have been completed, and work is underway on the next round.
Going forward: Rick will continue to fight for full funding of our police and fire departments, even in tough budget years. He’ll keep investing in prevention, because communities are safest when young people have opportunities and families have support. And he’ll keep working with neighborhoods to make our streets safer for everyone.
Making Housing Affordable
Too many Sacramento families are one setback away from losing their home. Under Rick’s leadership, Sacramento became the first city in California to earn the state’s Pro-Housing designation, recognition that Sacramento has consistently made real policy changes to build more housing, especially infill housing, easier and more affordable.
Rick championed Streamline Sacramento, an ambitious package of reforms designed to cut the red tape and bureaucratic delays that make building housing slower and more expensive than it needs to be.
These reforms include objective design standards, ministerial approvals, and dozens of process improvements that reduce friction for builders and bring more certainty to the development process.
Rick will keep pushing for more housing that working families and seniors can actually afford. That means continuing to reform city processes, supporting infill development, and making sure Sacramento is incentivizing and approving the housing our community needs.
Economic Growth
A strong Sacramento needs a strong local economy. Rick is focused on making it easier for small and medium-sized businesses to open, grow, and thrive in our neighborhoods, creating good jobs close to where people live.
The same Streamline Sacramento reforms that are accelerating housing construction are also making it easier to open and operate a business in Sacramento. Rick has championed practical changes that help real business owners navigate city processes:
The Small Business Liaison Program provides personalized guidance for restaurants and other small businesses working through permitting, with dedicated staff, educational resources, and quarterly training sessions.
The Temporary Certificate of Occupancy program allows businesses to begin training staff and stocking shelves before final sign-off, cutting the dead time that costs small operators money.
The Self-Certification and Instant Building Permit programs accelerate the plan approval process for restaurant and commercial tenant improvements, with the City now evaluating expansion to retail, office, and warehouse spaces.
Rick will continue to push for economic development that creates opportunities in every corner of our community. That means more streamlined processes, targeted investment in neighborhood commercial corridors, and making sure small business owners have a customer-service oriented City Hall that supports them.
Homelessness
Homelessness is one of the most difficult challenges facing Sacramento. Rick believes we have to do two things at once: expand shelter and services for people who need help, and protect the quality of life in our neighborhoods. That’s a hard balance, and Rick is committed to getting it right.
Sacramento is projected to spend $48 million this coming fiscal year primarily on sheltering, and Rick believes that investment must continue, even in tough budget years. He has supported expanding shelter capacity and permanent supportive housing, and has pushed to strengthen the City’s partnership with Sacramento County to deliver the behavioral health and addiction services that unhoused residents need to move toward stability.
Rick supports the All in Sacramento Framework, which takes a comprehensive approach across eight focus areas: coordinated access, prevention, outreach, emergency shelter, rehousing assistance, permanent supportive housing, service integration, and system capacity building.
He also supports a regional Joint Powers Authority to address homelessness, because this crisis doesn’t stop at city limits and the response shouldn’t either.
Rick knows that expanding shelter gives the City the ability to offer real options to unhoused residents, and with those options comes the responsibility to enforce local rules that address the impacts on neighborhoods. He supports implementing the City’s regulations to ensure that as shelter and housing options grow, communities see relief on the ground.
Rick will keep fighting for expanded shelter and supportive housing, stronger county partnerships on behavioral health, and a regional approach to a regional problem. He won’t retreat from the investments that are working, and he won’t ignore the impacts that neighborhoods are experiencing.
Investing in Our Youth
Before Rick Jennings was a City Councilmember, before he was a school board member, he was a mentor to young people who needed someone in their corner. He’s been doing that work every single day for a quarter century. As CEO of the Center for Fathers and Families, Rick built a nonprofit that now serves more than 1,000 at-risk youth every day through after-school enrichment programs at 13 low-income schools across Sacramento.
CFF also provides over 100 adults each week with parenting, legal, and health services, because strong kids come from supported families.
On the Council, Rick championed Measure L, which provides dedicated city funding for youth programs. He believes that investing in young people is both the right thing to do and one of the smartest long-term investments the city can make in public safety, workforce development, and community strength.
Rick’s experience in youth development is 25 years deep, working directly with kids and families in some of Sacramento’s toughest neighborhoods. That experience shapes how he approaches every issue on the Council, from public safety to housing to economic development. When Rick fights for a policy, he’s thinking about the families he’s served and the kids he’s watched grow up.
Rick will continue to be a fierce advocate for youth investment in Sacramento. That means protecting Measure L funding, expanding after-school and mentorship programs, and making sure every young person in our community has the opportunities and support they need to succeed.