$3 million spent. Zero return.

​​

Since 2017, the City of Alhambra has depended on expensive outside consultants for routine work—engineering, traffic, and even public relations—yet these firms have failed to deliver results. Nearly $3 million has been paid out with no tangible improvements, no accountability, and nothing to show beyond flawed recommendations and mounting invoices.

​

It gets worse: analysis of the City’s own documents shows that despite offering little more than unsupported, ineffective advice, one firm—Kimley-Horn—was not held accountable. Instead, its original $2 million contract was quietly tripled in 2024 to $6 million. Residents once again received no meaningful outcomes or measurable results, only escalating costs and empty promises funded by taxpayers.

​

This raises a fundamental question: Is this how public money should be managed or spent? The answer is clearly no.

​​

​

We Have Lost Over $100 Million

 

This is where the story gets worse. Much worse.

​

After the I-710 Freeway “gap” project was canceled in 2017, Alhambra received a one-time $240 million Measure R allocation—our sales tax money meant to return to the community for 16 critical transportation projects. But years of bad consultant advice and continued non-performance stalled progress entirely. This delay has already reduced the purchasing power of those funds by more than $100 million, a loss the City will never recover.

​

The situation is worsening. Because expensive consultants have continued to push ineffective projects with almost no scrutiny, the City has taken virtually no meaningful action for nearly a decade. Under the current schedule, major construction on just two large projects wouldn’t begin until 2030, with only minor pedestrian improvements planned for 2027. By then, escalating labor and material costs will further erode the remaining funds—leaving too little money to complete even those two projects.

​

Alhambra risks losing the ability to solve its severe traffic problems because City leadership has allowed delay, mismanagement, and inaction to squander nearly a quarter-billion dollars of public money.​