POLB Sets $760MM Budget for FY 2025

Aerial view of Pier B, courtesy of Port of Long Beach.

The Long Beach (Calif.) Board of Harbor Commissioners has signed off on a $760 million budget for the Port of Long Beach’s (POLB) 2025 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, 2024, according to the Port. The budget will next be sent to the Long Beach City Council for approval.

POLB, as the City’s Harbor Department, does not use tax revenue to support operations.

The FY 2025 budget is 19.5% higher than the budget adopted last year, due largely to infrastructure projects like the Pier B On-Dock Rail Support Facility, which will break ground later this year, and the proposed Pier Wind, POLB reported June 17.  The budget, it said, also includes “a record $25.8 million transfer to the City’s Tidelands Operating Fund, which supports quality-of-life projects along Long Beach’s seven-mile coastline.”

Operating revenue is estimated to be 6.8% higher than last year’s budget, according to the Port.

Next year’s proposed capital budget comes in at $368.3 million, 47.2% higher than the prior year, the Port said. Of that total, $204.9 million is for the Pier B project. The Pier B On-Dock Rail Support Facility is slated to double the size of the existing Pier B rail yard from 82 acres to 171 acres, and more than triple the volume of on-dock rail capacity handled annually from 1.5 million TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent units) to 4.7 million TEUs. It will also feature a depot for fueling and servicing up to 30 locomotives at the same time and a full-service staging area to assemble and break down trains up to 10,000 feet long. The overall project will be built in phases with completion scheduled for 2032. Constructing the facility will involve adding more than 130,000 feet of rail, quadrupling the number of tracks from 12 to 48, widening the rail bridge over the Dominguez Channel from two to three tracks, and reconfiguring and improving nearby Pico Avenue and Pier B Street. More than 1,100 construction-related jobs will be created by the $1.567 billion Pier B On-Dock Rail Support Facility. 

POLB’s capital budget for FY 2025 also includes approximately $25 million in Clean Truck Fund subsidies to support the transition of the heavy-duty truck fleet to zero emissions, according to the Port, which noted that it has “twin goals of a zero-emissions cargo-handling fleet by 2030 and zero-emissions trucking by 2035.”

“This budget reflects our values, balancing serving as an economic engine for our city and region and growing responsibly while limiting environmental impacts,” POLB CEO Mario Cordero said during the June 17 announcement. “We are optimistic about the year ahead and this spending plan builds our competitive advantages for the green future.”

“Because trade, construction and tourism support 51,000 jobs in Long Beach—or one in five jobs—it’s important we stay focused on attracting business, building for the future, and moving cargo sustainably,” Harbor Commission President Bobby Olvera Jr. said. “This budget advances these goals by leveraging our stable financial strength as a top gateway for global commerce.”

In a related development, the Los Angeles (Calif.) Harbor Commission on June 6 approved a $2.6 billion FY 2024/25 budget for the City of Los Angeles Harbor Department that it said will support the “community investment, decarbonization of port-related operations, workforce development, and cargo infrastructure modernization” priorities of the Port of Los Angeles.

Separately, cargo was down in May at both the POLB and the Port of Los Angeles.