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Letter of Transmittal ii Town Profile The Town of Los Altos Hills is a residential community located in Santa Clara County, California. It is about 18.6 miles northwest of San Jose and 38.5 miles southeast of San Francisco. The Town was incorporated on January 27, 1956. The Town encompasses 9 square miles and has influence on an additional 5.2 square miles of unincorporated land adjacent to the Town’s boundaries. The “Sphere of Influence”, maintains over 60 miles of pathways and 100 acres of open space. The Town operates under a Council‐Manager form of government. Policy‐making and legislative authority are vested in the governing City Council, which consists of five Councilmembers. City Council members are elected in overlapping four‐year terms and, from amongst themselves, appoint a Mayor and Vice Mayor every December. The Council is responsible for passing ordinances, adopting the budget, appointing Planning Commission and Volunteer Committee members, and hiring the City Manager and City Attorney. The City Manager is responsible for carrying out the policies and ordinances of the City Council, overseeing the day‐ to‐day operations of the Town, and appointing the Town staff. The Town provides a full range of essential services through a combination of in‐house staff and contract services. Services provided by the Town’s 26.2 full‐time equivalent employees include planning, engineering, building inspection, maintenance of public infrastructure, recreation, limited parks, open space maintenance and general management. Partnership with neighboring cities, counties and special districts are utilized to provide law enforcement services, fire services, sewer conveyance and treatment, water services and technology support. The Town also entered into public‐private partnership in areas of code enforcement, trash collection, payroll services, staff augmentation and Westwind Barn management. The cost to provide these essential services are reviewed annually as part of the Town’s operating and capital budget process. The annual budget serves as the foundation for the Town’s financial planning, monitoring and control. All departments of the Town are required to submit requests for appropriation to the City Manager each spring. The City Manager reviews these requests and develops a proposed budget. Prior to June 30 of each year, the City Manager submits to the City Council a proposed operating and capital improvement budget for review. The Council holds public hearings and a final budget is adopted on or before June 30. Budgetary reviews and controls are applied as described in the Notes to Required Supplementary Information on page 80. Budget to actual comparisons are provided in this report for each governmental fund for which an annual budget has been adopted. For the General Fund, this comparison is presented on page 74 as part of the required supplementary information. For governmental funds other than the General Fund, this comparison is presented in the Combining Statements and Individual Fund Statements section of this report, starting on page 86. Throughout the year, the Administrative Services Department monitors economic changes that may affect the Town’s revenue stream, coordinates with departments in identifying changing needs and demands, and presents budget adjustments to the City Council as part of the mid‐year review. Public inputs are filtered through the Town’s standing committees and to staff liaisons. These inputs are considered in the development of the budget and presented to the City Council for consideration as part of the budget review and throughout the year as separate Council action items. Resolution 60-20 Page 11